How to automatically e-mail all your purchase orders and attach a photo of each item
Mobilizing ERP and
Corporate Documents
Problem 1: Management of Corporate Documents
You have lots of information in your organization that is not stored in your ERP system: pictures, drawings, instructions, contracts and a lot more.
These documents can be presented in your ERP system with no easy link to the physical files.
The Solution: Baan Hot Link
•Manage corporate documents in your organization from within Baan or ERP Ln.
•Link Baan entities (Items, orders, lots) to corporate documents
• Link Baan and ERP Ln sessions to corporate documents.
-By linking photos to Items, we are able to
- Link photos from within Maintain Item Data- Access photos from Maintain Item Data-Access photos from Display Item Data-Access photos from Maintain Purchase Order Lines
Baan Hot Link Example: Items and Photos
Baan Hot Link’s Concept
• Have a good naming convention for your corporate documents, derived from existing fields.
• As an example, item photos can be <item code>-<item Rev>.jpgFor item 2345689 (Revision 02), attach photo 2345689-02.jpg
• When you wish to add a new photo to your archive of documents, pick it with Baan Hot Link and it will automatically be copied to the archive with the correct name.
•If a different program populates documents for you, you need to create them according to your naming convention
From within Maintain Item Data
Click here…
Using Baan Hot Link: Maintain Item Data
The following sub-menu will appear
You can define up to 12 links for every session
Choose “Costing Data” and link to the Excel Sheet with the Item’s Cost Calculation
File from the Baan server
Choose “Drawing” and link to the Item’s Drawing
File from the Network
Choose “Item Folder” and link to the Folder where all files for this item are stored
Folder on the Network
Choose “Circuit” and get the Product’s Printed Circuit from the Manufacturer’s web site
Deep links with web sites
Wilds cards gives you a possibility to choose not only specific file names.
Example for <Item Number>-*.pdf
Link Items to Documents from within Maintain Purchase Order Lines:
Problem 2: Delivery of ERP Documents
Everyday your company creates several documents such as purchase orders, invoices and reminders.
These documents need to be sent to suppliers, customers, subcontractors or internal employees.
You may wish to attach other documents like AutoCAD drawings, pictures or work instructions together with these Baan documents.
The challenge is to perform this in a process that is reliable, speedy and cost effective.
Baan Mail-Merge allows companies to automatically e-mail, fax, print and archive documents. This powerful engine can handle any output comings from Baan or Infor ERP Ln.
Hundreds of companies around the world are happily using Baan Mail-Merge daily to automate sending of documents to their business partners.
The Solution: Baan Mail-Merge
1) Cut postage costs
2) Cut stationary costs
3) Cut phone costs (telephone tags or waiting for a fax)
4) Improve cash flow
5) Reduce lead time
6) Improve company image
Baan Mail-Merge: Benefits
Baan Mail-Merge performs the following:
1- Parse to individual documents2- Recognize supplier/customer/business partner3- Match with e-mail, fax, printer and archive preference 4- Customize for a professional look5- Add “inserts” that are document specific6- Personalize with cover letter7- Deliver by preference
Baan Mail-Merge: 7 Steps
1) Baan Mail-Merge: Parse
1) Parse Baan Mail-Merge automatically parses the output run and recognizes each document
200120
120130
123456
226
221
225
223
338
339
334
332
123
222
223210 345672
342567
200203
230345
120130
675234
223109
234569
123459
1) Parse
2) RecognizeBaan Mail-Merge automatically recognizes the business partner for each document (supplier for purchase order)
POSupplier
2) Baan Mail-Merge: Recognize
1) Parse
2) Recognize
3) Match
Baan Mail-Merge automatically matches each supplier or customer with their preferred method of delivery: e-mail address, fax number, printer name and archive path
3) Baan Mail-Merge: Match
• Each document can be sent to a combination of e-mail, fax, printer and archive
• Request Receipt and priority for e-mails
• Return e-mail addresses is defined when no e-mail is defined.
• You can define multiple printers for every printout.
• Possibility for using multiple address books
• Support for different e-mail systems
• Support for different fax servers
• Printing on server and client printers
• Archiving on server or client
Match: E-mail, Fax, Print and Archive
1) Parse
2) Recognize
3) Match
4) Customize
Baan Mail-Merge reformats the output coming from Baan/Infor Ln and adds what is needed for a professional look
4) Baan Mail-Merge: Customize
An easy to use design allows for adding company logo, background
Customize: Generate Professional Documents
You can also sign your documents electronically
• Logo and background can be JPG or PDF files
• Add additional pages at the beginning or at the end of the document.
• Add a specific page between every two pages of the document (ex. Terms).
• Support most fonts
• Support most languages and encodings
Customize: Make Professional Documents
1) Parse
2) Recognize
3) Match
4) Customize
5) Add
5) Baan Mail-Merge: Add
Baan Mail-Merge automatically adds “inserts” that go along the document, like photos and datasheets of the items ordered
Add: Attach Additional Files
Documents defined in document management system (like Baan Hot Link) can be automatically attached to document being sent.
Documents linked using ODM can be linked too
The purchase order it self
The same file can always be sent together with the Baan document (as an example, the terms and conditions with the PO). You can also attach files depending on certain values in the document (as an example, an AutoCAD drawing for every item in the PO).
Add: Attach Additional Files to E-mail
Mtorres from Spain uses cgm files (Graphics Metafiles) to view items.
They had a requirement to e-mail a production multi-level Bill of Material and attach a cgm file for every item.
This was also accomplished using Baan Mail-Merge auto-attach mechanism.
Add: Attach Additional Files, an example
1) Parse
2) Recognize
3) Match
4) Customize
5) Add
6) Personalize
Baan Mail-Merge automatically prepares a personalized message body or cover letter to go along the document
6) Baan Mail-Merge: Personalized
A personalized message to go along with the e-mail or fax being sent – includes free text, variables and labels. A user defined footer with address data.
You can have a different message for every language of the document
Personalize: Message Body, Cover Page
1 Parse 2 Recognize 3 Match
4 Customize 5 Add 6 Personalize
5 Attach Terms and photos of items
6 Personalized Message Body
4 Customize
1) Parse
2) Recognize
3) Match
4) Customize
5) Add
6) Personalize
7) Deliver
Baan Mail-Merge can automatically delivers each document to the associated business partner.
7) Baan Mail-Merge: Deliver
With Purchase Approval Module
Approve Purchase Orders before delivering
• With the “One by One” mode you can review each document before sending it, verifying e-mail addresses and fax numbers, writing a special note to go along with the document sent, possibly add/delete attachments, setting the e-mail priority and ask for an e-mail receipt.
Deliver: One-By-One
As an example, “Print Purchase Orders” to the Baan Mail-Merge device. (The purchase order run has 700 purchase orders)
In few moments…
400 purchase orders will be e-mailed
100 purchase orders will be e-mailed and faxed
180 purchase orders will be faxed
700 purchase orders will be archived on disk
20 purchase orders will be printed (to be manually picked and sent by mail)
All this will be done automatically!
Deliver: Automatic
Baan Mail-Merge produces a log file that reports all documents and attachments that were sent.
Follow-up: Report of all Documents Delivered
JVK in Canada uses the NAZDAQ solution to e-mail and fax acknowledgments to customers, including sending a copy to the sales representative.
Deliver: Faxing, an example
When JVK was looking for a fax solution to integrate with Baan Mail-Merge in 2003, few options were available.
They decided to choose Internet faxing as they found it to be an economical solution to in-house fax servers.
It has proved to be definitely faster when dealing with the great volume of documents they have.
Talum in Slovenia prints 250 invoices and 250 Performa invoices every day.
Deliver: Printing, an example
They wanted to print each one at different printers in different departments: Finance, Marketing, the mother company, the warehouse and the shipping departments.
All this was accomplished using Baan Mail-Merge.
A Company in Germany found a creative way to use Baan Mail-Merge.
Deliver: Archiving, an example
They began to use it in 2003, but wanted to archive all old purchase orders from 1999.
They initiated a job and printed all the old orders and created thousands of PDF files.
W&H Dentalwerk Buermoos in Austria were using Baan 4 and looked for a tool to be able to send PDF business documents by e-mail.
Baan Mail-Merge: Baan 4, Baan 5 and ERP Ln
They implemented Baan Mail-Merge in 2002 and used it to e-mail purchase orders and to dispatch production orders in a nightly job.
When W&H decided to roll-out Infor ERP Ln 6.1 in 2007, they upgraded Baan Mail-Merge.
Josef Nobis from W&H summarizes the relationship with NAZDAQ: "The tools are reasonably priced and functioned problem-free once it is installed. Due to the service contract we could use the newest versions at any time and receive perfect support".
To get a free demo version contact us at:
NAZDAQ is a provider of Add-ons for Baan and Infor ERP Ln Customers. Other products from NAZDAQ are B2Win, B2Email, Baan Hot Link, B-Notified, Baan Color Changer and Baan Query Tool