DYNAMICS AXAPTA : Zakta Feature for Saudi Arabia

The Zakat Report feature:
The Zakat Report feature enables you to print Zakat reports that are required by the Department of Zakat and Income Tax. This update makes it easier for you to perform the following processes for Zakat reports:

• Enter additional data that is required for general company information, assets, and depreciation.
• Set a vendor to a subcontractor-type vendor.
• Update the Zakat information for a vendor.
• Create the chart of accounts to specify how the Zakat item is recorded on the voucher transaction, and how the account is used in a Zakat report.
• Generate a Zakat report at the end of the financial year.
• Change a Zakat transaction.
• Regenerate a Zakat report for submission to the authorities before closing the fiscal year.

The Environmental Sustainability Dashboard for Microsoft Dynamics AX

This cost-effective solution is designed to help Microsoft Dynamics AX customers track their energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, also known as their carbon footprint, over time allowing them to be more proactive in their approach to environmental issues. The dashboard represents Microsoft's commitment to developing technology that supports environmentally sustainable business practices.

Streamline data collection

To facilitate collection of energy consumption data, business processes such as accounts payable and inventory management have been extended, thus simplifying a previously painful and time-consuming process.

Measure energy use and emissions

A study of 150 companies in March 2007 by AMR Research showed that businesses consider their most important environmental goals to be energy and emissions reduction.1 The Environmental Sustainability Dashboard enables companies to track and report on four environmental performance indicators related to energy and emissions as prescribed by the G3 guidelines from the Global Reporting Initiative, an internationally recognized organization formed to facilitate sustainability reporting.

Knowledge is power

Microsoft Dynamics AX integrates environmental data with business data thereby allowing companies to make decisions that consider their environmental impacts. When businesses understand the resource consumption of their operations, managers can make fiscally and environmentally sound decisions about the way their companies are run.

How to implement software for insight into environmental issues
As part of the Microsoft Dynamics Sure Step implementation methodology, the dashboard will be accompanied by detailed guidance to help customers and partners gather the data needed to create a greenhouse gas inventory and setup that information in the dashboard so they can gather accurate, auditable and actionable environmental data.

To learn more about how the Environmental Management Accounting and Environmental Sustainability Dashboard guidance can benefit your company, read Microsoft Dynamics AX helps businesses track their “green” performance - today and tomorrow.

Rebates and Trade Merchandise Spending
Many process manufacturers, especially those in consumer packaged goods and commodity industries, use rebates and trade spending programs to promote their products. Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX provides users with effective tools to monitor and manage these promotional programs.

Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX calculates rebates in the same way it calculates sales commissions. However, the system credits the amount to the customer rather than to the salesperson. In most cases rebates are cash payments or discounts taken against a customer’s invoice. On the other hand, trade merchandise spending programs usually involve an amount of money accrued by a customer to be spent for events and promotional items.

Figure 2. Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX enables a manufacturer to define specific rebate and trade credit policies for each customer.

Rebates are typically defined by a customer code and item code, and can be calculated in several ways:

Amount per kilo or pound
Amount per case
Percent of sale

Rebates are calculated at invoicing, posted to the general ledger, and accrued. Rebate amounts are not shown on the customer invoice, but the rebate can be paid to the customer in the form of an account credit or a cash payment. Calculation methods used by Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX are:

Rebates by customer by product
Rebates by customer group by product
Rebates by customer by product group
Rebates by groups of customers by groups of products

Trade and Merchandise Allowances
In addition to rebates, Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX supports trade and merchandise allowances (TMA). Trade and merchandise allowances are defined in the same way as rebates, but TMA amounts are posted to general ledger accounts. TMA amounts are typically defined by product category and may vary by customer or customer chain. For example:

Customers usually spend TMAs on promotional items offered by the manufacturer. With Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX, multiple rebates or TMA programs can be defined and applied to a single order. However, the system calculates and applies all rebates and TMA amounts individually.
Defining Data for Rebates and TMA Programs
In using rebates and trade merchandising, users can specify several kinds of data, including:

Rebate type or trade merchandising allowance type.
Calculation as a percentage of gross sales, percentage of net sales, dollars per case, or dollars per UOM.
Definition by all, group, and table for customer and item.
Effective date and expiration date.

Payments and accruals can be calculated at several intervals:

Monthly
Quarterly
Yearly

In most rebate and trade promotion programs, the manufacturer pays different customers in different ways. Some customers will have the rebates or merchandising allowances credited to their accounts, while others will request direct payment.

Reporting and Documentation
Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX provides easy-to-read reports reflecting actual sales amounts (the invoice amount after all discounts, rebates, and trade spending allowances). With this report, managers are able to assess the true margin generated by specific items or programs.

The system also provides a monthly report by customer showing:

Opening accrual amount
Additional accruals
Payments and accounts receivable (A/R) deductions
Closing balance

Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX also creates a rebate and TMA statement for each customer. Using this report, the customer and the manufacturer’s salesperson can see what credits the customer has earned over a given time for various products and programs, helping to keep salespeople informed and strengthen customer relationships.

Lot Management in Axapta

Lot Management
Many process manufacturers need extensive lot management capabilities. Lot management functionality in Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX goes well beyond simple lot tracking. For example, process manufacturers must be able to track materials:

From a specific supplier
As intermediate and finished goods
When created during production
As sold to specific customers

Production Date Tracking
For accurate reporting and tracking, Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX captures the production date, as well as the lot number, of raw materials received from a specific vendor.

Using the production date of each raw material or finished good, the system calculates the shelf life of the given lot. Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX can also manage shelf advice date (for example, “best before” date), and the retest date for every lot of a particular product. (Often a product must be retested on a regular basis to ensure the quality of the product is still acceptable.)

Production date and shelf life are used to determine which lots to pick, employing either first in/first out (FIFO) or first expired/first out (FEFO) rules.

Lot Picking Options
In process manufacturing, different lots of the same product can have different chemical attributes. Consequently, when a customer reorders a given item for the same use, the product from the original lot must be sold or used in production to ensure the identical result. Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX enables the user to specify whether the material or product may come from any lot, must come from a full lot, or must come from the same lot that was shipped to the customer on the last order. As a result, the customers can request a specific lot to match specifications and parameters used in previous orders.

Although most manufacturers provide their customers with specifications for standard products, some customers order products with more precise requirements or formulas that differ slightly from the standard formula or recipe. To fulfill these orders, the manufacturer either must produce a special lot that meets the customer’s request exactly or find a lot already in inventory that meets those requirements. If a lot meeting the customer’s needs is already in inventory, locating and pulling it to fulfill the customer order usually is quicker and more cost-effective than producing a special lot. Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX helps the manufacturer maintain exact lot location information and accurate specifications by lot, making it easy to quickly determine if a lot meeting the customer’s requested specifications is in stock or whether one must be planned and produced.

Shelf Life Management
Process manufacturers manage shelf life and the selection of products for sale or use in several ways:

FIFO
FEFO
Best Before (“best if used before the given date”)

With Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX, manufacturers can choose a picking option and link that option to the quality control (QC) system for each product. By using this capability, those lots that have been tested and those requiring retesting because they have been on the inventory floor too long can be quickly identified. Managing material shelf life helps ensure that products used or shipped still conform to specifications and have not changed or degraded over time or from exposure to air, moisture, or other environmental factors.

Lot Disposition and Status with Quarantine Management
With Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX, the user can specify one of two main inventory dispositions—available or unavailable—for a given lot, and then define multiple statuses per disposition.

A product is considered unavailable in Process Industries for Microsoft Dynamics AX after the lot has been moved to a quarantine area or designated as quarantined. Users can define multiple quarantine areas within a warehouse, such as separate testing or damaged goods locations. After a lot has been quarantined and flagged as unavailable, the user can record multiple reasons why the particular lot was quarantined.
Reasons include:

QC hold
QC failed
Returned
Damaged

Tracking lot status provides manufacturers with information about why a product is unavailable and supports correct disposition decisions based on whether the lot is simply waiting for testing to be finished or has been tested and failed.

Test