TECHNOLOGY & CAPABILITY ENHANCEMENTS

MULTI-SESSION

Support for multiple application windows, which can even be launched by clicking on a mail link or a ‘shortcut., Each of these is simultaneous ‘windows’ into different areas of your business processes & reports. Dynamic data refresh and the display of different views when resizing – e.g. smaller windows displaying a more consolidated view of data, will improve organizational management and productivity.

MULTI-THREADED

A ‘thread’ is a specific task that is being performed by the microprocessor. Enhanced capabilities will be enabled such that each application window can perform more tasks simultaneously instead of linearly, including processing messages from the server. Multi-core processors, even on the desktop, are now common. We will take full advantage of these as well.

MULTI STACK ARCHITECTURE FOR SCALE-UP & SCALE-DOWN DEPLOYMENTS

To deliver the capabilities described above, and the ones that follow, Tally.ERP 9 will become ‘componentized – consisting of several layers of programs – often referred to as ‘n-tier architecture’. These software components are horizontally scalable, meaning that you can add one more computer to increase the computing power needed for a layer. In the same way, you can remove systems as needed, or collapse them into a single system – all of them even on a notebook, if required.

HIGH TRANSACTION CAPACITY WITH LOW LATENCY & MANAGEMENT

You start generating a report that needs to be extracted from a few thousand vouchers. This process is run in a ‘session’, which is isolated from all other users. Even if other users delete or modify any of the vouchers needed for the report while the report is being compiled, there is no impact on this session and you will get to see the report as if these other users did not exist.

In the same way, the user performing the edit will also be isolated. After the edit, he can open the voucher and see it with his changes, perhaps even delete it. The architecture described above will in itself deliver substantial performance and transaction handling capacity. To push performance further in those cases when the storage media (typically the hard disk) is busy with other operations, additional capabilities will store these transactions ‘temporarily’ in a ‘Q’ for later write, while the user is free to continue his work (these transactions are protected against power failures and so on).

PAYMENT ENGINE FOR DEBIT & CREDIT CARDS

The facility for online payments using a variety of payment mechanisms (NEFT, online banking, credit cards), as well as receive payments (Debit / Credit Cards, NEFT, etc) will be available.

FUNCTIONAL ENHANCEMENTS

ONLINE BANKING AND RECONCILIATION

Collaborating with Banks who wish to facilitate their customers with this capability, we will provide Online Banking – including Payment Instructions, Standing Instructions, DD, NEFT, RTGS Transfers, Balance Queries, Instruction Status, Automated or Semi-Automated Bank Reconciliation.

POINT-OF-SALE FOR MOST RETAIL ENVIRONMENTS

Series B will support dedicated POS terminals, with Credit/Debit Card, Discount Coupons and various other payment mixes, Loyalty support, schemes, multi-layered supervisory control, simultaneous keyboard and scanner controls, integrated or isolated printing of bill and credit card authorization slip, item substitution, rate markup/markdowns, integration with measuring devices – such as weighing scales, bill suspension and retrieval, bill reversals and cancellations, etc. It can also be used for other store operations (receipting, inventory management, etc), and general business operations (finance and accounts) – both on the same machine or separate machines.

INCOME TAX

Comprehensive IT coverage encompassing corporate & individual income tax, including typical payroll requirements and e-Returns will be available.

EXIM DOCUMENTATION

Import & export documentation has become a growing need with the world economy becoming more open. This requirement will be supported, additionally covering the processes that need to be managed along with the documentation.

JOB COSTING

The enhanced Job Costing functionality will support most job costing needs to a level of granularity that is increasingly needed. We expect that you will be able to handle most, if not all, project accounting needs as well.

FIXED ASSETS

To take advantage of tax breaks as well as to manage organizational assets, this feature will support all requirements – from opening assets, adding, removing, amalgamating, grouping, vendor tagging, AMC‘s, servicing, service calendars, repairs and upkeep, refurbishing, breaking-down, depreciating and disposal for complete fixed asset management.

We have taken great pains to retain the essential look and feel as well and the user experience of the previous versions of Tally (6.3, 7.2, 8.1 & 9). Yet Tally.ERP 9 is a culmination of years of research & development – and with a development team of about 200 people.

TALLY.ERP 9, SERIES A, IS GEARED TO MEET THREE OBJECTIVES:

One is saving you time that you can invest elsewhere, including in growing your business (there is a direct correlation between the time top management invests in strategy and business growth). This is achieved via remote access capabilities and the integrated support center to enable many time-saving processes like remote audit & compliance and anytime, anywhere access to your live business data.

The second is to enable timely & affordable access to experienced professionals like Chartered Accountants (who wish to offer such services). Since these professionals can now access your data remotely, from anywhere in the world, as well as address your queries via the integrated support center, both the cost for such services and the time taken to resolve business problems will come down. Finally, new features in Series A, notably in taxation for industry & professionals deliver technical support for more of your business processes.

EXCEPTIONS ARE THE NORM:

Pause and consider your organization. You have laid down defined processes and procedures – so why do so many things land up on your table? Generally, within a defined framework, there will often be some need for a deviation. Software programs are great at supporting rigid, well-defined processes – and break down (or become complex) when managing these deviations. Principle: design to manage exceptions – defined processes will automatically be supported.

SOLUTIONS BRING PROBLEMS:

Especially with IT solutions! Some of your business problems are managed by a software solution and how many software problems do you now have to manage? Database administration, performance tuning, service packs, drivers, software conflicts, IT professionals – the list is endless. Principle: solving a business need should not add new problems – these must be solved as well.

KNOWLEDGE IS NOT KNOWN:

A lot of knowledge is contextual – when the situation arises we know how to respond. Therefore, no matter how much analysis is done, it is hardly possible to comprehend the full range of the simplest of the business processes. In a purchase process, one may follow the order, receipt, and payment for one item and just payment for another (say a consumable). Months can go by in needs analysis and yet things will be missed out. Principle: Do not assume that any system setup will not change.

GOOD IS ‘BAD’:

What’s essential for someone’s business can be a hindrance to you – and every business, even in the same business space, has subtle differences in what data is captured, what reports are needed, and what kind of control is needed. Principle: build in common functionality and build these well, and deliver capabilities that permit extremely easy extendibility and customisability.

Tally.ERP 9 security works on this concept – everything is open by default (full access). You progressively ‘lock down’ the system as the need arises. We believe that this mimics real-life functionality. To simplify the use of this system, you can define standard sets of rights and use these as stencils for specific users – adding or removing rights for that user, if required.

Once you open your company for Tally.NET remote access, you can apply the same level of control to such users – a Tally.NET Identity (ID) is added in the same way as the ‘normal’ user.

Other requirements are also covered:

• Administrators can be denied data access! This stems from our understanding that IT & System administrators (if you do have them, this is not a requirement for Tally. ERP 9), typically, need access to the system and not to business data. Now administrators can get access to all features of the Control Centre, the enterprise-wide control point, and be hands-off from operating on business data.
• You may have some data that requires an enhanced level of access control – you can specify a password that must be provided to even open the company. This is implemented with a secure encryption method and renders the data useless to anyone who manages to get a copy of the data files.
• Unencrypted data may need protection against casual theft. With Tally.ERP 9 you can specify that data is not accessible locally via an Education version.
• You might have customized and extended Tally.ERP 9 to deliver certain proprietary business capabilities: you might not like these to be available to others or ‘leaked’. With Tally.ERP 9, you can limit access to specific Tally.ERP 9 serial numbers, and even restrict access from Educational versions.
• Almost all security and access needs are covered by default. In case you require additional controls (say, suppliers are to be given remote access only to their respective accounts), these are customizable – contact your Tally.ERP 9 dealer or look up a Tally Service Partner.

The manufacturing business produces items with the usage of machines, tools, and labor. The core process of manufacturing involves raw materials that are transformed into finished goods on a large scale. Such finished goods may be used for manufacturing other, more complex products, such as household appliances or automobiles, or sold to wholesalers, who in turn sell them to retailers, who then sell them to end-users – the “consumers”.

BUSINESSES IN MANUFACTURING CAN BENEFIT IMMENSELY FROM TALLY.ERP 9 BY THE FOLLOWING FUNCTIONS AND FEATURES:

STOCK ITEM CLASSIFICATION AS RAW MATERIAL, WORK IN PROGRESS, FINISHED GOODS:

The user can classify stock items as per his requirements. In manufacturing concerns, the user will primarily have three broad classifications (Stock Groups) i.e.

• Raw Materials
• Work in Progress
• Finished Goods

All items that are procured to manufacture a particular item are called Raw Material & are grouped under the group ‘Raw Materials’, whereas, a product whose shape has changed, but has not reached its finished stage is called a Semi-finished item. These items will be grouped under the Group ‘Work-in-Progress’ and any item that is changed its shape/nature completely and reached the final form to sell is called finished Goods and is grouped under the ‘Finished goods’ group. The user can also create ledgers with the name Raw Materials, Work-in-Progress, and Finished goods under the group Stock-in-Hand. Once the user has deactivated the option ‘Integrate Accounts with Inventory’, based on the Closing balances entered by the user, Tally.ERP 9 automatically displays the total closing balances of all the ledgers grouped under the group Stock-in-Hand.

BILL OF MATERIAL WITH AUTO ADJUSTMENTS OF STOCK:

In many industries, especially assembly units there are several components involved in the manufacture of finished items. It is extremely difficult to issue stock items each time a product is manufactured. Such situations can be handled in Tally.ERP 9 by using Bill of Material. To generate a Bill of Material, create a new item (finished or intermediate product) and specify the components that go into the manufacturing of that finished/intermediate product. Now, using a manufacturing journal, specify the number of items to be manufactured. Tally.ERP 9 immediately selects all items that go into the manufacturing of the finished product and automatically adjusts (decreases) the stock. Any additional manufacturing cost like wages, power, water charges, etc, can be added to the value of the manufactured product.

ADDITIONAL COST OF MANUFACTURING WITH NOTIONAL VALUE AND PERCENTAGE:

When a product is manufactured, other than the component cost, there are manufacturing costs like labor, electricity, accessories, etc, which will have to be added to the cost of the product. In Tally.ERP 9, the additional cost can be added to the product while entering stock Journals or at the time of entering a manufacturing Journal (use B.O.M). The user can specify additional cost as a % of the component cost or even specify a notional value.

Silver is for a single user, while Gold is for unlimited users on a Local Area Network (LAN).

What other differences exist between editions? None – all capabilities and features will be available in every edition. The only reason to choose between editions is the number of systems from which Tally.ERP 9 can be accessed.

A ‘user’ in this context is actually a computer system. We do not complicate your decision with ‘concurrent user’, ‘named user’, and so on.

Therefore Tally.ERP 9 Silver can be activated (as in licensed) on one computer and used from that same computer. Tally.ERP 9 can be activated on one computer and can be accessed from any or all computers on that network.

Maintaining our philosophy – Power of Simplicity ® – you only need to take a call on which of the above options suits your needs.

If you decide to buy a Silver edition, you can migrate to Gold anytime. And with a Gold, as users increase, there is no need to come back to us for additional user licensing and avoid the commercial, purchase & administrative aspects of these changes.

SILVER EDITION – SINGLE USER

Where a single computer with Tally.ERP 9 is adequate for your operations, the Silver edition is what you need. A ‘user’ in this context is actually a computer system. This edition comes with all the features & capabilities including Tally.NET and services like Remote Access. With Silver, you can manage as many companies (business entities) and personal books of accounts as you need. You can also create as many users as you need, and provide each with the appropriate level of security. Your only restriction is that these users will all need to access Tally.ERP 9 from the system on which it is activated (licensed).

Since Silver supports Remote Access as well, you can authorize access to your Chartered Accountant, who with his Auditors’ Edition of Tally.ERP 9, can remotely provide audit, compliance, and advisory services. Similarly, your Tally Service Partner can, via Remote Access, answer your queries and provide support. As a Silver user, you can create one Tally.NET identity, which you can use to log in to your own system from home or while on the move. Other users of Tally.ERP 9 can also grant access to you by authorizing this Tally.NET identity.

GOLD EDITION – UNLIMITED MULTI-USER

Where more than one computer needs to have access to Tally.ERP 9, a Gold edition is what you need. Any number of users can simultaneously have read and write access. Note, that there can be some degradation of performance with a large number of users and we have found that the Gold edition is usable with a maximum of ten users. (Series B will deliver the Diamond & Platinum editions with support for hundreds & thousands of users). Like with Silver you can manage as many companies (business entities) and personal books of accounts as you need. You may also create as many users as you need, and provide each with the appropriate level of security. With Remote Access, you can authorize access to your Chartered Accountants, who with their Tally.ERP 9 – Auditors’ Edition, can remotely provide audit, compliance, and advisory services.

Similarly, your Tally Service Partners can, via Remote Access, answers your queries and provide support. As a Gold user, you can create ten Tally.NET identities, with which your mobile users can log in to your system from home or while on the move. Other users of Tally.ERP 9 can also grant access to you by authorizing these Tally.NET identities. It is easy to migrate to Gold from Silver – contact your Tally Partner. Your license will get updated to Gold and you can now access Tally.ERP 9 from multiple systems without the need to make any other change!