Archive for December, 2008

January 2009 Tax Table Update

Monday, December 22nd, 2008

U.S. and Canadian governments recently announced payroll tax changes that may affect your Sage Accpac ERP, Sage BusinessVision Accounting, and Sage Pro ERP Payroll Update Plan (PUP) clients. These changes have been incorporated into the January 1, 2009, payroll tax updates, which will be available according to the payroll ship dates schedule.

To download tax table updates online, you or your clients may simply select the Download Tax Table link on their Customer Account page. Sage Accpac clients will receive activation codes as part of the download process.

To receive tax table updates on disk, clients can select the Order PUP on Disk link on their Customer Account page, or call the Customer Care team at 800-642-7693, Monday through Friday, 6 a.m. to 5 p.m. Pacific time. A shipping charge of $19.95 plus tax will apply to payroll tax updates on disk; this charge covers any shipments released for the remainder of a client’s subscription year.

Posted in Accpac Stuff | No Comments »

Dismal Economy = Hiring Opportunity

Thursday, December 18th, 2008

It was another bad month for unemployment: November was the 11th straigth month of job losses and some 560k jobs were shed during the month. Even small business, long a driver of employment adds in the economy, dropped some 80k jobs for the month.

What’s to celebrate with all this dismal news, you wonder? Why there’s a wealth of talented employees looking for work right now. Massive, often indiscriminate, lay-offs by corporate giants force lots of skilled, educated workers into the ranks of the unemployed and most are available for less money than ever before. SurePayroll, a Glenview (Ill.) payroll administrator that tracks small-business hiring trends, recently reported that most companies in their survey increased hiring year-to-date. “It’s like a fire-sale on talent,” says Lawrence Hasbrouck, owner of RETI, a professional real estate training firm which employs trainers in Mississippi and Alabama.

According to a professor at University of Penssylvania’s Wharton School of Business, most small businesses have less pressure to cut jobs than publically traded ones, so they are at liberty to hire a talented employee when they see a good opportunity. Another way small companies are taking advantage of top talent is by using them as independent contractors. Even when somebody is let go from a small company, usually it’s done with an understanding that as soon as the economy picks up they will be rehired. “That’s flexibility you never see at larger corporations,” notes Matt Owens, a professional head hunter for Robet Half International.

So the moral of the story is, if you need good talent then now is the time to snap it up. Even if you have to scrimp to get by for a little while because the economy isn’t going up any time soon, you may not have a chance to find such talent in abundance for such a reasonable price any time soon.

Posted in General Business | No Comments »

New Name, New Blog!

Tuesday, December 16th, 2008

A few things have changed since I introduced the Mindover Software Blog.

First and foremost, we recently changed our company name to Mindover Software. The name change more accurately reflects our strategic focus on supporting your business software and process needs to further your company’s productivity. Because we sell and support business software from Sage, a new name emphasizing software simply made more sense. Plus, having software in our name helps puts us at the top of Internet searches in Google and Yahoo when prospects are doing research on such topics as “accounting software“, “business software” and “CRM software“.

Second, we decided to upgrade our Blog software to a more customizable solution from Wordpress.org. With Wordpress, we can now add more features to help make our Blog more enjoyable to all our readers. Coincidentally, it also helps us with Internet Searches by allowing us to associate our new Blog directly to our company URL: http://www.mindovercorp.com. So not only can we provide you with more helpful information about such topics as Sage, business software in general, and technical issues related to your particular Sage application, it also allows us to be found more easily by prospects who may need help with their business software.

One final point I’d like to make is how a Blog can erase borders and geographical differences. While it’s true that  Mindover Software has offices in Austin, Dallas and San Antonio, Texas, we happen to have clients from around the US. A Blog makes it easier to exchange ideas with people on a variety of issues – how CRM can help drive revenue, MAS 500 can solve manufacturing bottlenecks and Sage Accpac can transform accounting from a cost into a value added benefit — without regard to time or physical proximity.

So don’t sit on the sidelines. Get involved in the Mindover Software community of clients, vendors and friends by adding your thoughts on all things Sage, Accpac, MAS 500, SageCRM or anything related to accounting and business software.

I hope to hear from you soon!

Posted in General Business, General Software Musings | No Comments »