Dynamics 365 Business Central

Dynamics 365 Business Central – Handling the message “Only the Posting No. Series can be filled in on recurring journals” in Recurring Journals

Gavin WhittakerLeave a comment

Introduction

When entering a Number Series on a “Recurring General Journal” batch you receive the message “Only the Posting No. Series can be filled in on recurring journals”.

In this post we’ll take a quick look at the functionality of a Recurring General Journal, why I think the message appears, and look at two techniques you can use to ensure a unique document number is created each time the journal is posted, without the need to constantly update the document number before each posting.

A Brief Look at Recurring Journals

The Recurring Journal has unique features over and above a normal General Journal. Its designed for entries that are made regularly such as prepayments, depreciation or payroll journals etc.

The great thing about Business Central is there are many other features you can use for journals like prepayments and depreciation such as deferrals or standard journals however in this post we are focussing on recurring journals

One of the main features of the “Recurring General Journal” is that unlike a “General Journal”, after posting a Recurring General Journal the journal lines remain and the posting date is updated based on the recurring frequency. This means if don’t have to re-key the same journal every month.

However this also poses a question for what we do about the Document Number? Ideally we want to be presented with a unique document number after posting each iteration of the journal, so how can we accomplish this if this isn’t being updated?

The Error

The first thing we can try and do is use a “No. Series” on the batch, however when trying to select a “No. Series” on the “Recurring General Journal” batch you are presented with the error message below

So I guess the first question is…..why is the system preventing us from using a “No. Series” on the batch?

Although I can’t be certain, I assume its because after we post the batch the lines on the recurring journal will remain. If this is the case the number in that number series will be used over and over again (unless we change it). Therefore the system is preventing this.

So the next question is…..how can I get a unique document number on the journal line without having to update it every time its posted?

Using a “Posted No. Series” on the Journal Batch

Now, its worth noting we could just enter a descriptive document number on the unposted journal lines and fill in the “Posting No. Series” on the batch header. The document number on the lines wouldn’t then be carried through to the General Ledger Entries.

For example here I’ve populated the “Posted No. Series” on the batch header:

Now the document number I’ve entered on the lines on my Depreciation Journal below won’t be carried through to the “General Ledger Entries” when I post the batch

I’ve now posted the batch and you can see the document number being used has come from the “Posted No. Series” not the document number I used on the journal lines.

However, I want to use my own unique document number on the lines, but I don’t want to have to change it after each posting.

How can I achieve this?

Getting a Unique Document Number using Placeholders (Variables)

This is the final piece of the puzzle and its pretty cool 😊.

You can achieve unique document numbers by using placeholders right in the document number 😊

So going back to my Depreciation Journal, if I want the document number to include the date I can enter it as per below:

In the example above when I post the journal the system will replace the placeholder %1 with the Day number, %4 will be replaced with the Month name and %6 will be replaced with the year of the posting date of the journal.

The document number is then shown as per below in the “General Ledger Entries”

When I post this for May, there’s no need to update the document number. The system automatically replaces the placeholders using the posting date in the final document number in the posted entries.

If you’re curious about what other placeholders can be used. There is a full list below:

  • %1 = The day number of the period posting date
  • %2 = The week number of the period posting date
  • %3 = The month number of the period posting date
  • %4 = The month name of the period posting date
  • %5 = The accounting period name of the period posting date
  • %6 = The fiscal year of the period posting date

If anyone has used the deferral functionality they are exactly the same and more information on them can be found here https://learn.microsoft.com/en-gb/dynamics365/business-central/finance-how-defer-revenue-expenses

Conclusion

This post highlights the issue when using “Recurring General Journal”, in that you can’t use a “No. Series” on the journal batch.

We’ve looked at why I think that restriction exists, and how you can instead use the “Posting No. Series” on the batch header to ensure your posted entries receive a unique document number each time.

Alternatively, you can use placeholders within the Document No. field to dynamically generate meaningful document numbers without having to update them after every posting, which I find particularly useful 😊

Thanks for reading!

Dynamics 365 Business Central – Why when I create new users do they get full access by default

Gavin WhittakerLeave a comment

Introduction

When you create new users in Business Central, unless you tell Business Central otherwise, they are granted full access to the first company they log into.

In this post I’ll walk through how you can prevent this by making changes in the “Licence Configuration” page

How do new users get their default permissions?

When adding new users to Business Central, they are automatically assigned permissions based primarily on:

  1. The Security Groups they are in (not covered in this post)
  2. The Licence they have been granted.

Its therefore crucial we modify the permissions they inherit as part of their Licence. We do this via the “Licence Configuration” page.

Licence Configuration

Now lets look at how we can configure the permissions using the “Licence Configuration” page

First I open the “Licence Configuration” page

Here we can see all the different licence types for Business Central.

I’ll configure the permissions for the “Dynamics 365 Business Central Essential” licence. To do this I click on the hyperlink for this licence and it opens the page.

As you can see by default granting a user this licence gives them full permissions to the first company they log into. This is the reason why I see so many administrators having to manually go and reset permissions after creating new users.

We can prevent this now by editing the page and customising the permissions.

To do this click the pencil at the top of the page to make the page editable, and click the slider for “Customise Permissions”.

We can now change the permissions. I’m just going to remove the “D365 BUS FULL ACCESS” permission set. To do this I highlight the line and click “Delete Line”

My Licence Configuration now looks as per below:

Now when I create a new user that’s been assigned this licence they won’t have full access.

You can control the access your partner gets by editing the “Delegated Admin agent – Partner” licence

Conclusion

This post goes through how to control permissions to new users based on the licence configuration.

There are other factors to consider when planning permissions in Business Central, like security groups, which could mean you can remove all permissions from the “Licence Configuration”. Maybe we can touch on this on a future post 😊.

Thanks for reading!

Dynamics 365 Business Central – How to default a General Ledger account onto a Purchase Invoice using “Recurring Purchase Lines”

Gavin WhittakerLeave a comment

Introduction

There may be times when you regularly use the same General Ledger code on a Purchase Invoice for a certain Vendor. For example, a rent GL account when posting an overhead invoice for your rent.

In this case it would be great if the system would default the GL account onto the Purchase Invoice after you select the supplier.

In this post we’ll look at how this is possible using “Recurring Purchase Lines” in Business Central.

The Scenario

The scenario we have is every month we receive a rent invoice from our landlord for our business premises.

Every month when keying this into Business Central we have to select the supplier and then manually pickup the relevant GL account.

We want a method to streamline this process by having Business Central automatically populate the Purchase Invoice detail with the GL code as soon as we select the Vendor.

We are going to achieve this by configuring and using “Recurring Purchase Lines”

Setup the Recurring Purchase Line

The first step is to search “Recurring Purchase Lines” and open the page

Once in the page I’ll click “New”

I’ll then enter a code and a description and then select the GL code and any dimensions I also want to default.

Now the Recurring Purchase Line is setup we need to go and add it to our supplier.

Add the Recurring Purchase Line to the Vendor

I’ll therefore go to “Vendors” and click “Related > Recurring Purchase Lines”

You then pick the Recurring Purchase Line we just created and select “Automatic” so the associated GL code is automatically inserted when we create new Invoices and Credits

Now the setup is complete all that’s left is to test it 😊

Let’s create a Purchase Invoice

To test I’ll go to the “Purchase Invoice” page and create a new invoice. (I could do this from the Vendor by clicking “New Document > Purchase Invoice” but for this demonstration I’ll go the long way round 😊)

Next I’ll pickup the Vendor, and as you can see the GL account has been automatically pulled through onto the Invoice lines.

This is a great time saver and ensures the correct GL code is always picked up.

Conclusion

This post has been through how to setup and configure Recurring Purchase Lines. This can help with the speed and accuracy of entering Purchase transactions.

Its also worth noting this functionality can be used for Items as well as GL Accounts. You can also assign the Recurring Purchase Lines to multiple suppliers and add multiple lines to each Recurring Purchase Line.

All in all its just another fantastic feature of Business Central 😊

Thanks for reading!