Unit4 Financials 2022 Q1 Release
Unit4 Financials 2022 Q1 Release
The Unit4 Financials continuous release model helps to ensure that finance departments are equipped to handle their most pressing operational challenges.
March 2022
Unit4 Financials 2022 Q1 was made available on 8th March 2022.
The new release contains all the previous Unit4 Financials functionality, new features plus additional customer requested fixes. This release also replaces the temporary solution in place to protect against the Apache Log4j vulnerability identified in December 2021 with a permanent fix.
Highlights of the release include:
Finance:
- Print Invoices – attachment filename
- Copy Company
Billing:
- Use Structured Output in scheduled task for type Billing Issue
Console:
- OpenID configuration restructure
Administration:
- QR Codes on Print Formats
- Print Formatter and Workflow Designer Authentication
- OpenID Connect Authorization Code Flow with PKCE
Procurement:
- Requisitions and Purchase Orders
General Fixes/Updates
- Using a presenter with totals lines on matching from input lost a selected line because the software thought it was a total
- ITK process ending time was being recorded even when a process component failed early on in the process run
- Billing Flexifield dates on entry would always save on a different date if a Browser used a different timezone from the server
- Export to Excel Spreadsheet did not handle divide by zero cells properly
- Assets part disposal depreciation calculated incorrectly when cancel depreciation used
- Assets full disposal calculating depreciation in disposal period incorrectly when cancel depreciation used
- Assets Cost Centre Transfer – when transfer fails, the depreciation lock was incorrectly left in place
- Transformation Parameters XML validation field label was not being translated
- Running Table-Link Helper would left-justify document numbers, so then DTL would fail
- Browse details export did not pass though the URL of hyperlinked user refs to a relevant recipient e.g. Excel
- Bulk Load incorrectly creating log files for unrelated user and company code
The Release Notes detailing the fixes and features within this release can be found in the Documentation area on Unit4’s Community 4U.
Read here to find out when Financials updates are scheduled for 2022, along with important information for legacy V13 and V14 users.
Is it time to upgrade?
Upgrading your finance software can provide new functionality, increased automation and more efficient processes.
5 top functionalities you might not be using in Unit4 Financials
March 2022
Simple improvements to accounting software can often go a long way in saving time and effort for the user. The good news is that through its quarterly update model (Continuous Release), Unit4 Financials is constantly being enhanced to deliver the best possible user experience.
Have some valuable recent software additions passed you by? Here’s our rundown of some of the most noteworthy Unit4 Financials changes and new functionalities you may have missed…
A couple of new features in this area may be of interest. The first, released in 2020 Q1, was the option to change the posting period during the process of the payment run.
A further option is the ability to copy payment information into user references on the original invoice that was posted.
New options in this area make it easier to communicate payment information to customers.
There is now an additional checkbox under the Print Invoices function. When you print or send an invoice via email to a customer account, this allows you to add the PDF invoice to the Financials document.
You now also have the ability to generate an XML format invoice, rather than having to send a PDF.
The Print Invoice function can be set up as either a standalone or scheduled task. These additional enhancements (XML formatting and PDF attachments) can also now be used with scheduled tasks rather than just with standalone tasks.
Previously, your intercompany control account held on your destination and receiver masters could be set up as a matchable account, but not as a customer supply account. This meant if you wanted to generate invoices and send them to that intercompany counter party, you would have to create a separate element (because of the inability to generate any tax or VAT against the counter party when generating the invoice).
This has now changed, so the intercompany control account can also be a customer supplier account. It means you can use the same element against your intercompany control account, as you can against a control account where you were creating invoices etc. for that intercompany counter party.
The benefit is that it reduces the number of elements you need to create as part of your intercompany process.
The last couple of years has seen the introduction of some useful new access control, audit and general security measures.
From Version 14 onwards, you can now allocate users with different capabilities for different companies (for instance, you can assign a user with read only access for company A, but full admin access for company B).
In earlier versions of the solution, you had to log in as a LEVEL8 user or a LEVEL8 sub-user to change passwords and unlock users. In reality, this made it difficult to audit who was making the change. Unit4 has now widened the options for assigning capabilities to users. It makes it possible, for instance, to assign ordinary users with the ability to unlock other users and change those other users’ passwords.
For audit purposes, many organisations require journals to be reviewed by someone other than the document creator before those journals are posted. To facilitate this, Unit4 has introduced an optional control whereby users who are posting documents to the in tray can be prevented from posting the same documents to the books.
This update was designed primarily for cloud, but can be used with on-premise deployments as well. On the output device master, you now have the ability to specify that you want the file or document you are transferring to be transferred via SFTP. This is useful for tasks such as transferring BACS payment files when transacting with suppliers.
This option has also been added into structured output. It means that generated files – whether they are Avalara, XML or any other format – can also be transferred in SFTP.
How to unlock the full value of Unit4 Financials
From best practice advice, system optimisation and configuration through to migration from legacy systems, Millennium Consulting enables organisations to realise maximum return on their Unit4 Financials investment. For expert input from an Elite Unit4 partner, speak to us today.
Unit4 Financials and Community 4U
March 2022
The Unit4 product community is well supported by thousands of global customers and partners alike. Better still, the product developers pay very close attention to it, which means if you have a good idea for an enhancement, there’s actually a good chance of it being incorporated in a future update.
Here’s a closer look at the Unit4 peer support available, and at how active customer participation results in a stronger, more dynamic product offering.
What is Community4U?
This is Unit4’s customer and partner community, made up of dedicated forums devoted to specific Unit4 solutions (including Unit4 Financials).
Through it, you can engage with other customers and partners, get in touch and ask questions, share tips and best practices and find solutions that will make your life easier.
The community also includes a process through which customers can suggest product enhancements (see below).
Benefits of accessing the community
The most obvious benefit of Community4U is the mutual support element. Users can learn from each other’s experiences, quickly get answers to queries and keep up with best practice.
Dipping into the community can also be useful from a professional growth perspective. Because it’s well supported, it’s a good way to engage with peers (people in similar roles within similar organisations, for instance) and build your network.
How to log a product enhancement idea
Do you have an idea for making a particular template more closely aligned to your reporting requirements? Would a simple tweak to a particular field save you a whole lot of time?
As a Unit4 Financials customer, you can use the community to log any suggestions any time you want. Suggestions are reviewed regularly by developers and opened to a vote to all portal users.
If an idea gets customer backing, Unit4 will assess whether it’s deliverable. Popular and do-able suggestions go into the development backlog and are ultimately delivered.
Some recent suggestions for enhancements have included the following:
• Remove trailing spaces automatically
• Set the name of the attachment sent by email
• ‘Remove the line’ checkbox as movable item on input template
• Custom portal per company
• Sorting payment proposals by date instead of payment code
• Mandatory fields on element template
• Cr/Dr differentiation on Distribution Master / Revaluation
• CODA Procurement: Irrecoverable Tax on Reversing VAT
• Schedule Change Periods (000223)
• Flexi fields in Assets as an alternative for the user (free) fields
The beauty of Unit4’s Continuous Release process is that tweaks and enhancements are rolled out to customers in a seamless way. These enhancements are driven in large part by customer feedback. Examples of user suggestions that have found their way into the Continuous Release cycle recently include ‘Remove trailing spaces automatically’, ‘Remove the line checkbox as movable item on input template’, and ‘Sorting payment proposals by date instead of payment code’.
Accessing the community
To set up an account for the Unit4 Community 4U, please send an email to community4u@unit4.com
Are you considering an upgrade in 2022?
Upgrading from legacy finance software helps to ensure system security, the best possible user experience and, ultimately, higher productivity. For expert upgrade input from an Elite Unit4 Partner, contact Millennium Consulting today.
2022 Unit4 Financials Roadmap
February 2022
2022 Financials Roadmap
The Unit4 Financials continuous release model helps to ensure that finance departments are equipped to handle their most pressing operational challenges. This includes new regulations, volatile market conditions, and internal pressures to do more with less.
To ease your transactional workload, 2022 looks set to see the introduction of some welcome additions to the Unit4 Financials platform. Here’s a closer look at what’s in the update pipeline.
One of the most attractive features of Unit4 Financials is its multi-everything design (country, company, currency, tax, language), ensuring the ability to handle even the most complex or evolving corporate structures.
You can run your system as a single version worldwide, thereby ensuring consistency and visibility across the enterprise. But alongside this, you also get the flexibility to satisfy a huge range of local statutory and accounting approaches found around the world.
We are set to see further evidence of this ‘global yet local’ approach in 2022. A prime example comes in the form of new structured output for closer integration with ELSTER, Germany’s electronic tax return system.
The solution already includes the ability to produce invoices in an xml format. Unit4 is in the process of enabling this with billing, also.
The solution should also shortly accommodate QR codes on print formats.
For auditing and general ease of admin, life becomes so much easier if you can save actual billing documents within the platform itself. Unit4 added attachments to billing in early 2021. They are now going a step further, enabling you to copy those attachments over to the Financials document.
The last couple of years have seen a gradual extension of Financials’ ‘scheduled tasks’ functionality, (hierarchy updates, asset depreciation and reconciliation are a few recent examples). Driven by customer demand, you will also shortly be able to add a scheduled task for the Open/Close Period.
A new Supplier Filter will be added to procurement.
Future vision for 2022 and beyond
This functionality is already available with an on-premise set-up, Unit4 is looking at creating a cloud version.
Introduced in Continuous Release 2020, tablelink for cloud gives you an on-premise version of your link tables, and an API that takes the data into the cloud. Expect further enhancements to this function over the coming years.
• Define name for email attachments
Certain activities within the product involve emailing attachments to customers or suppliers (invoices and statements, for instance). This upcoming new function enables you to define the names of these attachments. This can be useful for preventing the messages from being caught by user email filters.
• Expiry for element banks and addresses
You will shortly be able to expire a bank as against a customer or supplier account. You can still see it (but not use it) when inputting your documents.
• Specify address for email output
At the moment, the system picks up the default email address for a customer or a supplier account. Unit4 looks set to make it easier to send different categories of communications to different email addresses within the same customer organisation.
• Copy company set open number range
It will shortly become easier to copy and move defined extracts of company information.
Areas of focus for Unit4 over the next few continuous releases include:
• Support for Wildfly 25
• 3rd party library updates
• Corrective maintenance
Seamless interoperability with business applications of all types is a further major benefit of the Financials product. Building on this, Unit4 will be looking to introduce further ways to integrate Financials with the Microsoft Office 365 suite. Other technical enhancements include the following:
• Clustering performance
• Cloud SaaS improvements
• Cloud product usage
• Rationalised and centralised DB access
• A simpler cloud deployment system
• Upgrade script improvements
• Audit trail upgrade improvements
• Download xml client libraries
• Alternative document repository
• People platform integration
Important upgrade information
Support for Unit4 Financials V13 has already been withdrawn. Support for V14 will expire at the end of 2022. Failure to upgrade before then increases the likelihood of incurring extended support charges from Unit4.
Upgrading enables you to:
• Access the latest functionality
• Reduce operational risk and processing costs
• Continue to access Unit4’s “in support” software maintenance and support package
• Ensure you are up to date with Unit4’s latest software security package
As an Elite Unit4 Partner, Millennium Consulting specialises in delivering a seamless upgrade, while also ensuring your upgraded solution is fully aligned with organisational requirements.
To explore your options in Unit4 Financials, contact us today.
Unit4 Financials Continuous Release Schedule 2022
February 2022
Unit4 Financials Continuous Release Schedule 2022
The Unit4 Financials platform is maintained via a continuous release model. Thanks to this predictable cycle of quarterly updates, users get timely access to the type of customer-driven enhancements that helps to keep the finance department ahead of the game.
Read on to find out when Financials updates are scheduled for 2022, along with important information for legacy V13 and V14 users.
Unit4 Financials planned releases
| 2022Q1 Release | Planned 8 March 2022 |
| 2022Q2 Release | Planned 7 June 2022 |
| 2022Q3 Release | Planned 13 September 2022 |
| 2022Q4 Release | Planned 6 December 2022 |
These dates can sometimes be subject to alteration.
To read a summary of what has been added since October 2020, along with a closer look at some of the most noteworthy enhancements, read What’s new in Unit4 Financials Continuous Release?
Post release, an .iso for each release is available from the Software Distribution Server.
Information for V13 users
V13 was previously maintained via Service Pack updates. The last Service Pack (23) was released on 27 September 2019. These previous updates are still available to download on the Software Distribution Server. No further Service Packs for V13 will be forthcoming.
Discover the latest Unit4 Financials features in V13 here.
Please note that maintenance for V13 was retired in February 2021.
No critical bug fixes for this product are being issued.
Information for V14 users
V14 is maintained via a full re-release of the software on .iso, available from the Software Distribution Server. The most recent V14 Release Pack – Release 17 – was made available on 28 November 2021.
Future Releases for 2022 are still to be confirmed (at time of writing) and will be dependent on user demand and the nature of any issues that arise.
Discover the latest Unit4 Financials features in V14 here.
Please note that maintenance for V14 will cease at the end of December 2022.
Distribution and notification of cloud updates
Unit4 Cloud customers are notified by Unit4 Cloud support when their pre-production and production systems will be updated. This information can also be found within the Cloud Services – Release Schedules area.
Updating your legacy systems
Support for Unit4 Financials V13 has already been withdrawn. Support for V14 will expire at the end of 2022. Failure to upgrade before then increases the likelihood of incurring extended support charges from Unit4.
Upgrading enables you to:
- Access the latest functionality
- Reduce operational risk and processing costs
- Continue to access Unit4’s “in support” software maintenance and support package
- Ensure you are up to date with Unit4’s latest software security package
As an Elite Unit4 Partner, Millennium Consulting specialises in delivering a seamless upgrade, while also ensuring your upgraded solution is fully aligned with organisational requirements.
Is it time to upgrade?
Upgrading your finance software can provide new functionality, increased automation and more efficient processes.
Illustrating the Benefits of Unit4 Financials Archiving – A Case Study
January 2022
For customers with high transactional volumes, the adoption of best practices around Unit4 Financials archiving allows them to significantly improve system performance and save storage space. A recent project undertaken by Millennium Consulting demonstrates the positive impact of archiving for Unit4 Financials users.
Read on to discover what we found, along with practical tips on addressing common archiving issues.
A case study in focus
Recently, Millennium Consulting undertook a company archival project for a global player in the pharmaceutical industry. The period covered was from 1995 to 2015.
The archiving exercise revealed that more than half of the documents within the organisation’s database were capable of being stored more efficiently.. Through the project, we were able to free up a significant amount of disk space within the production database but more significantly, we de-risked the organisation’s accounting solution against performance degradation over time.
At the conclusion of the project, we found that the archive tables on the database amounted to a significant 2.2GB of space. In total, 821,773 documents were archived representing 58% of the total documents within that company.
Most of the customers we speak to say that the volume of financial data they are processing is growing year by year. This is partly down to organic development, i.e., as an organisation matures, the number of transactions it is involved in intends to increase as a matter of course. But other trends are also in play here. Notably, for compliance and performance management reasons, businesses recognise the value of capturing a much wider range of granular data relating to individual transactions. The flipside, of course, is that more data means a greater burden on storage capacity and system performance.
What do we recommend?
• Archive all dormant companies, initially to the internal database using arc tables. Straight after internal archiving, you can then transfer these tables to the external archive database.
• Externally archive all live companies, except for the last four or five years. Again, you need to archive internally before transferring the tables to the external database.
• Archive to the internal database all live companies, apart from the last two full years.
• We recommend leaving in the current books all live companies for the last two full years.
If you follow this approach, then at each financial year end, you need to undertake the following:
• Archive to the internal database the third oldest year (e.g., at the end of 2021, you would internally archive 2019)
• Archive to the external database the sixth oldest year (e.g., at the end of 2021, you would externally archive 2016)
Find out more
You can learn more about the archiving function for Unit4 Financials in this brief demonstration video:
As an Elite Unit4 Partner, Millennium Consulting provides expert input to ensure Unit4 Financials is fully aligned to your organisational requirements. For help with archiving a backlog of legacy data, devising an archive policy, or optimising your existing archive processes, speak to us today.
Benefits of the automation of manual processes in Unit4 Financials
23 ways to automate and reduce cost and risk, by setting up the automation of manual processes in Unit4 Financials
January 2022
Workflow
With more people working remotely, re-configuring workflow allows organisations to keep efficient by ensuring each process is streamlined and everyone interacts with the process at the right time.
Banking payment XML
Reduce manual effort by setting up XML bank payment files.
Intercompany PO’s
Setting up intercompany PO’s will stop the need for companies to raise separate PO’s one-by-one in each company. With the Intercompany facility it is possible (for example) to raise a PO in one company that is for goods services in two other different companies.
Unit4 XL reporting
Set up reports in Unit4 XL for real-time reporting from Unit4 Financials and reduce any unnecessary manual Excel work.
Auto VAT Calculation
VAT can be calculated automatically based upon the VAT code being supplied – therefore reducing the input burden being placed on the user.
Derived fields
The entry of documents can be assisted greatly using derived fields on the input templates. This can automate the population of many of the fields on the Input screens which will speed up data entry and enhance the user experience.
Allocation
Allocation provides a flexible, automatic means of allocating centrally incurred costs across an organisation's operating units, so reducing manual work.
Currency Revaluation
The automation of currency revaluation enables you to recalculate home (GBP) values based on foreign values. The foreign values are selected, either from details or from balances, for reconversion at new exchange rates.
Account Summaries
Account summary is a user configured enquiry form that allows information from suppliers to be brought together with transaction details, balance, and diary information to produce a single view of the data.
Electronic remittances
In Continuous Release, electronic remittances can be generated automatically by email during a payment run.
Element Authorisation
Element authorisation can be used to automate new vendor and/or customer authorisations and creation.
Automatic accruals
There is an automatic routine within the invoice matching module that can create accruals and post to the financials module, so reducing month end effort.
Archiving
Archive enables the user to remove old data from the books to an internal archive area within the database. The archive process improves the system performance experienced by a user by reducing the amount of information held on the books.
Attachments
The attachments framework allows a user to attach documentary evidence to element masters, financial documents, purchase orders and sales invoices. The information can be in a variety of formats eg spreadsheet, PDF, Word etc that provides working papers or backup to a transaction. Once attached, the user can also view, remove, or replace the attached file.
Service Desk
Reduce cost and risk with Unit4 Financials Support and Maintenance from the Millennium Service Desk team.
Interface Manager
Interface Manager gives control back to the finance team to run and schedule their own interfaces so alleviating members of the IT department of doing these tasks.
Unit4 Travel & Expenses
Streamline and automate the expenses process, giving you more control over costs, better enforcement of company policy and help reduce the time and effort it takes to process employee or subcontractor expenses.
AutoCash
Save time and effort by automating your bank statement processing – automatically load, post, match and reconcile any items on your Bank Statements with transactions recorded in Unit4 Financials.
Unit4 Purchasing & Invoice Matching
Enforcing the authorisation and control over expenditure at the start of the process, rather than after the fact on receipt of invoice helps companies to stick to their budgets, control costs and gain efficiencies from better supplier leverage.
Unit4 Invoice Capture
Unit4’s Invoice Capture automates the capture and posting of invoices through intelligent OCR scanning and posts directly into Unit4 Financials.
Data Cleansing
Data cleansing removes major errors and inconsistencies that are inevitable when multiple sources of data are pulled into one dataset. Using tools to clean-up data makes the process more efficient since you will be able to quickly get accurate information into your system of choice.
Asset uploading
Do you regularly need to upload assets into Unit4 Financials fixed assets module – if so then Millennium’s Asset Uploader can streamline this process to help ensure all your assets are loaded error free.
Data Migration
Migrate your data between systems or to the Cloud, giving you quicker integration, faster implementation, and reduced risk.
Contact us for further details
Looking for ways to automate and reduce cost and risk? Submit your details and one of our experts will be in touch.
Archiving for Unit4 Financials
Archiving for Unit4 Financials
With any accounting or financial management solution, regular archiving helps you keep control over the size of your datasets, speed up processing times and ensure ongoing optimum software performance.
In this blog post, discover how archiving works in Unit4 Financials by Coda and the difference between the two types of archiving available.
What are the Archiving options in Unit4 Financials?
There are two types of archiving:
Internal archiving
With internal archiving, information continues to reside within your main Unit4 Financials production database.
Tables in the internal archive are given an “arc” prefix. The transactions within these internally-archived tables can still be accessed through enquiries. To search archived items, all you need to do is change your selector to ‘archive’ instead of ‘books’.
External archiving
External archiving involves moving data from the Unit4 Financials production database to a separate archive database. Note however, that this archive database still resides on the same database server. As with internal archiving, externally archived data is held in “arc” tables. To do external archiving, you first must do internal archiving.
How to utilise Archiving for Unit4 Financials
With any accounting system, the larger the dataset, the longer it takes to process requests (e.g. queries, searches and transactional reports). Especially if your Unit4 Financials users are experiencing a gradual drop-off in response speed over time, it’s a sign that archiving is likely overdue.
To avoid having to routinely process potentially millions of lines of irrelevant data for each request, it’s certainly worth focusing on the following:
• Establishing an archiving policy
Matters to consider here include whether and how often users need to query data that is over a year or two old. You should also look at how often your AP/AR teams need to query transactions paid/matched over a year ago.
• Ensuring a correct archiving set-up
As a start, you need to ensure the archiving feature in your Unit4 Financials system has been activated and configured according to your needs.
Does archived data remain accessible?
In short, yes. When you have archived your data in Unit4 Financials, that data remains searchable.
When you submit a query on the system, you have the option to search live data only, or include archived data. For most users, the majority of day-to-day queries relate only to recent data. So for these queries, users can stick with the default live data search setting. Regular archiving means that the system does not have to trawl through swathes of irrelevant data, thereby helping to maintain optimal search response times on routine tasks. On those occasions where you need to check historical data, you can simply switch the query type to include archived information.
Unit4 Financials Archiving: Watch how it works…
This brief video further illustrates the differences between each archiving method to help you choose between the two. It covers the issues that commonly arise in archiving financial information and how you can resolve them within the system. We also share a case study illustrating the benefits of archiving.
(Published January 2022)
As an Elite Unit4 Partner, Millennium Consulting provides expert input to ensure Unit4 Financials is fully aligned to your organisational requirements. For help with archiving a backlog of legacy data, devising an archive policy, or optimising your existing archive processes, speak to us today.
Business Change in 2022
Business Change in 2022
January 2022
The financial crisis of 2008 fundamentally altered the environment for the Financial Services industry and since then banks and insurance companies have spent hundreds of £ millions on regulatory compliance initiatives.
In the insurance world for example, IFRS 17 will continue at the forefront of insurance companies thinking until 2023 and beyond. Designed to achieve the goal of consistent, principle-based accounting for insurance contracts, IRFS17 requires insurers to integrate data from across their organisation and create a single version of the truth. However, the “golden source” data created not only enables them to meet their regulatory obligations but also to access granular data that was previously inaccessible. It is a classic case of the law of unintended consequences.
In December 2021, the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) issued Initial Application of IFRS 17 and IFRS 9—Comparative Information (Amendment to IFRS 17). The amendment is a transition option relating to comparative information about financial assets presented on initial application of IFRS 17. The amendment is aimed at helping insurers to avoid temporary accounting mismatches between financial assets and insurance contract liabilities and therefore improve the usefulness of comparative information for financial statement users. (https://www.ifrs.org/projects/completed-projects/2021/initial-application-ifrs-17-and-ifrs-9-comparative-information-amendments-to-ifrs-17/)
2022 is likely to be a challenging year for the insurance industry. For jurisdictions working towards a 2023 effective compliance date, the pressure has increased and the next six months will be critical if the deadline is to be met.
Millennium Consulting believes that compliance with the new regulation can allow insurers to become disrupters, digitise their processes and fundamentally re-engineer their Target Operating Models.
So, whether your actions are driven by regulatory compliance or from the desire to adopt best practice, Millennium is here to help. Our team are experienced financial markets professionals with deep domain expertise, be it products, market mechanisms or the business and regulatory drivers that are shaping the industry. Working with many of the world’s leading financial markets and insurance companies we help them define, manage and deliver the change they need to achieve market leadership.
What’s new in Unit4 Financials Continuous Release?
December 2021
What’s new in Unit4 Financials Continuous Release?
New functions rolled out under recent Unit4 Financials quarterly releases have significantly enhanced the user experience, further enabling your finance team to streamline business processes, reduce operational risk and free up resources for value-added work.
Here’s a summary of what has been added since October 2020, along with a closer look at some of the most noteworthy enhancements…
At a glance: release date summary
| CR 2021 Q4 (7th December 2021) |
| CR 2021 Q3 (14th September 2021) |
| CR 2021 Q2 (9th June 2021) |
| CR 2021 Q1 (9th March 2021) |
| CR 2020 Q4 (8th December 2020) |
| CR 2020 Q3 (14th October 2020) |
| V14 R16 (27th July 2021) |
| V14 R17 (end November 2021) |
- Hotfix to protect Unit4 Financials in the Log4j Java library
- Table Link Transfer Client
- Billing: Use Structured Output on Final Issue
- Billing: Copy Attachments on Posting
- Invoice matching: Set number of background matching threads
- Structured Output – UBL 2.1 Transformation: XML can be validated against the UBL 2.1 Invoice schema
- Attachments can now be managed from within the Billing Browse screen
- It is now possible to attach the PDF Invoice or Credit Note to the Billing document on final issue
- Scheduling a task of type Print Invoices now permits you to generate structured output for invoices (for example, XML in UBL 2.1 Transformation)
- Purchase orders approval can now be viewed across company in read-only mode
When you save masters, trailing spaces are now automatically removed. Print invoicing functionality is also improved, including support for XML formatting, as well as for invoices in pdf format.
- Documents outputs can now be written to an SFTP location
- Leading and trailing spaces are automatically removed when updating master names and short names
- The ‘Print Invoices’ function now allows an XML invoice. Transformation to be generated and sent. A pdf from a print format can be attached to the Finance document as its primary attachment
- The ‘Remove’ checkbox for additional lines in input is now positioned on the right-hand side by default
- Structured Output – UBL 2.1 Transformation: the generated XML file is now validated against the UBL Invoice schema
- Structured Output – UBL 2.1 Transformation: new vocabulary available including IBAN, attachment ID
This release included a number of enhancements that actually go a long way in improving the user experience. Examples include the new option to sort a paylist in descending order. There is also a new ‘element authorisation status’ for the financials selector master, which means that an element that isn’t authorised for changes can be excluded automatically without having to send a reminder or statement.
- Download XL for Unit4 Financials
- Document master setting to prevent the user who originally posted a document to the intray from posting the document to the books
- Pay/Collect summary now displays the pay proposal list by Pay Date in descending order
- Element authorisation status added to financials selector master
- New Punchout parameter added, user email
- Review Punchout items screen has new ‘select all’ and ‘deselect all’ buttons
- Punchout website now appears in a new tab in the browser
- Structured Output has a new transformation available, called ‘FEC’ Transformation (Fichier des ecritures compatables)
- Structured Output now allows zip file compression
- Structured Output can now generate .csv files without quotes
The new Tablelink for Cloud feature helps to simplify cloud migrations, removing the need to rewrite interfaces using web services and APIs. The release also included SFTP support, along with the ability to create comma-separated files that can be transported. e-Invoicing capabilities were also enhanced.
- Structured Output – CSV Transformation
- Structured Output – Output to SFTP
- Structured Output – Output to HTTP POST
- Tablelink for Cloud – Helper and API
- Improvements to upgrade Scripts
- e-Invoicing enhancements (Dutch XML invoice load)
- Unit4 Financials Idealization Process
Version 14 of Unit4 Financials saw the introduction of a new billing module. Among other enhancements, the 2020 Q3 continuous release saw an extension of these billing features.
- System users with OpenID Connect
- Billing – Quantities copied to Finance
- Billing – Print Preview
- Structured Output – Message Hub Output
- Unit4 Extension Kit – Samples
- Structured Output – GDPdU (local German product)
Having introduced a wide range of new features in the previous quarter, the 2020 Q2 release was focused mostly on routine product maintenance. However, there were a couple of new functions added. These were a scheduled task for reconciliation, along with changes to the Avalara export to accommodate HMRC’s ‘Making Tax Digital’ initiative.
- Scheduled task for Reconciliation
- Structured output changes – Avalara XMI export
This was the first release under Unit4’s new quarterly roll-out model (‘Continuous Release’). It introduced a wide range of new features.
- Schedule Task for hierarchy updates. You can now schedule new tasks for hierarchy updates and asset depreciation
- Submit orders on auto convert from requisitions
- Browse Transactions: Raise Corrective Journal
- Browse Transactions: Copy Document
- Deep link ‘balance’ drill to browse transactions
- Schedule Asset Depreciation
- Element template customisations copied via copy company. Element template customisations are now copied via the ‘copy company’ functionality
- Billing Copy Document
- Reconciliation Date & User. The introduction of this feature allows users to do retrospective reconciliation reports. In addition, the same level of functionality available in ‘browse details’ has also been extended to ‘browse transactions’
- Browse Transactions: Drill to Account Summary
- Browse Transactions: Edit Comment via related information panel
- Browse Transactions: Workflow Actions
- Provisional and Undo Year-End. Learn more about these features here
- Migrate customisations from test to live
- Allow change to balances on company master
- LRN Housekeeping without posting
- Reference Attachment Hyperlink as Direct Link
- GDPR for Element history
- Make use of address categories in Procurement Ordering
- Add Element Flexi-Fields data to Copy Company
- Change Pay Period. This is the ability to be able to change the period during a pay proposal
- Interco control to contain customer/supplier elements
Should you upgrade your Unit4 Financials software in 2022?
Support for Unit4 Financials V13 has already been withdrawn. Support for V14 will expire at the end of 2022. Failure to upgrade before then increases the likelihood of incurring extended support charges from Unit4.
Upgrading enables you to:
- Access the latest functionality
- Reduce operational risk and processing costs
- Continue to access Unit4’s “in support” software maintenance and support package
- Ensure you are up to date with Unit4’s latest software security package
As an Elite Unit4 Partner, Millennium Consulting specialises in delivering a seamless upgrade, while also ensuring your upgraded solution is fully aligned with organisational requirements.