Hello and Goodbye

Lots of changes have happened within AKM this month.

Following a successful placement with us, Colin now joins the AKM team. Colin has been involved in IT for many years and brings to AKM a wealth of practical experience and knowledge. We look forward to working with him and introducing you to him.

However on a sad note, Jonathan who most of you have worked with over the last 4 years has decided to move on. All at AKM will be sad to see him leave and I am sure our customers will too. Jonathan leaves AKM at the end of this month and we all wish him well wherever he goes.

Sage 50 HR 2007

Sage have now launched its replacement for Sage Personnel.

People are one of the most important assets of any business, but with the increasing demands of changing legislation and record keeping, managing them is becoming more complex and difficult.

Sage 50 HR 2007 helps cut through red tape, record employee information quickly and efficiently, manage the performance and development of people and reduce the paper trail. Starting from £250, Sage 50 HR 2007 helps businesses to:

• Keep track of hours worked - meeting Working Time Regulations and gaining a clear understanding of who works where and when.
• Track and plan staff progress - monitoring performance, recording reasons for salary or job changes and setting targets for improvement.
• Retain and make the best use of staff - keeping track of salaries, skills and qualifications.
• Keep the organisational structure up to date with details of locations, departments, costs centres and working patterns.
• Stores electronic copies of letters and contracts so you can find and retrieve information quickly and easily.
• Keep a clear record of all absences, warnings, disciplinary notices - offers the information needed to support any required actions.
• Schedules follow-up activities and get event reminders.
• Records termination of employment and redundancy consultations - to show compliance with redundancy legislation and defend any claims.
• Monitors trends by reporting at company, site, department or individual levels
• Helps meet health and safety requirements by recording accidents and injuries.
• Easily prepares and stores the evidence required to support inspections eg. Health and Safety, Quality Standards, Investors in People.
• Keeps employee information safe with a powerful security model offering multi-level access.
• Integrates with Sage Payroll and Sage Line 50 to avoid re-keying information and can also link to Microsoft ® Excel.

Sage 50 HR 2007 is available as a single company, single user program and is inclusive of one years' SageCover support.

Additional companies and users can be added for the following cost:

Sage HR includes a year’s free customer technical support, so we’re here to help if needed.

If you already have Sage Personnel, you can upgrade to Sage 50 HR 2007 and receive a 30% discount off the cost of the new software, representing a saving of £75 on a single user, single company version.

Call Tammy for more information on 0870 0429076

Personalised Email Stationary

Have you ever thought about having personalised email stationary with your own logo, email address, postal address and signature all ready every time you want to send an email?

This can be done with the layout, font and text size of your choice.

We can produce, test and install the stationary for you. All we need from you is your logos and text.

Your company would then have a regulative professional email layout that can be formal or informal and include key information about your business.

For a quote or more information please email chris@akm-it.co.uk.

Sage 50 Payroll RSS

A new feature in Sage 50 Payroll is an in-built RSS Reader, which allows customers to receive the latest, up-to-date information directly to their PC without the need to open their internet browser.

It’s a free service and keeps customers informed whenever areas of interest to them on Sage’s website are updated, for example the updates page.

At present, the Payroll Year End feed is the only RSS feed available within Sage 50 Payroll.

To subscribe to the Payroll Year End feed:

1. Within Sage 50 Payroll, open the News Feed menu and chose View Feeds.

2. In the Select a news feed to display messages from box, ensure Payroll Year End appears and then click Configure Feed.

3. Use the following information to configure the feed:

• Name - This appears automatically
• URL - This appears automatically
• Update Frequency - To specify how often the reader checks for an update, either type in or use the down arrows to set the frequency.
• Enabled - To enable the payroll Year End feed, select the Enabled check box.
• Set as Default - To display this feed automatically when the News Feeds window is opened, click set as Default.

4. To save the settings, click OK.

Business Premises

One of our customers has recently finished refurbishing some business units on Cambridgeshire Business Park next to Tesco in Ely.

If you are looking for premises from 1,200 sq ft upwards, contact Sarah Perito on 01353 668385 for more information and to arrange to have a look around the various units.