Many improvements in our database items. We've
been checking and rechecking our item descriptions and pricing
as they are updated.
Shout out to our old time users that report problems. You guys
keep us on our toes. Keep telling us what bugs you!
Inflation is happening. Check out the 11,000 price changes! Tariffs are being factored in to list prices now so load the newest update and check your assemblies and estimates!
You may notice that the newsletter no longer
includes news from before 2022. That's because we took those items
and put them in our archive on the website. To view them click
Price Point History
If you are interested in what is coming in
QuoteMagic! please refer to our website at https://www.pricepnt.com/PMiPad.html
- Tim Clover
We're proud to release PricePoint 5.6, our newest version that has been reworked for Windows 11. We hope you like it! The big change is proper scaling in printed invoices, estimates, proposals, etc. If you have changed your (Settings) Display, Scale and Layout to 125% to better read your screen, then you will be well acquainted with the printout not filling the entire page. Anyway, it's fixed in 5.6.
I have created a bunch of new shortcut codes for copper fittings and Viega press water fittings as part of the improvements that are in the works for our QuoteMagic app. If you would like to download the new shortcut codes, First back up your shortcut codes, Utilities, Selective backup, and check Shortcut codes, then click Utilities, Bonus Programs and choose Import Shortcut codes for all manufacturers. - Tim Clover
You may not recall our Quotemagic app, It puts your PricePoint flat rate book into a android tablet so that service work can be billed in the field. We've been frankly dissapointed by its reception and are wondering if its flat rate only model is the problem. I've been experimenting with adding a T&M section to the application so users can add materials, labor and extra charges to an invoice, Let me know if this might be of any interest to you (415-492-9211) - Tim Clover
Occasionally, I'll have a discussion with a user about how to set up pricing for a particular set of items. Explaining how we set up discounts on items can be complicated although the process is pretty simple. An alternative to setting up discounts is to select the Nets button and then select Real Prices from the Supplier Net setting. To improve the accuracy of the real prices for many items in our database, the real prices for many of the above items are now coming from Hodes, an online source of plumbing materials with a long track record of competitive pricing. I have improved real prices on galvanized and black steel nipples in common sizes and red brass nipples (1/2" through 2"). Polished chrome plated brass nipples 3/8" and 1/2" have also been added in common sizes. -Tim
Hey folks, I've gotten a lot of questions recently about the disappearance of the bookmark buttons in the updated pricing app. I have decided to bring them back so people can continue to use them. Nothing else has changed in Pricing, just added the buttons to the materials tab below the insert line button.
Announcement: we are instituting new installers for our software. This month is the last time we'll use the old installers that are built in a tool whose creators went out of business. If you install PricePoint on a new computer, you will get to use the new installers this month. - Tim Clover
Pricing has been the center of the PricePoint experience since we began our journey in 1993 and now we progress to streamline and simplify while still giving people the control they need over their bill of materials. To cover the changes that we have made, we begin by showing the old pricing screen so it can be easily compared to the new arrangement.
Our first priority was to keep users from having to search all over the screen for their settings so we added a settings panel on the left side of the Materials tab. At first glance we can see that Profit % moved to the top right above the Cost+, List and Retail buttons and next to the repositioned Pricebook button.
We removed the Use Nets checkbox and transformed it into the Supplier Cost Basis control. The Net and Discount buttons toggle to indicate how PricePoint calculates the cost of an item. To simplify and make things more logical we moved the Supplier Net/Discount Setting and grouped it below Supplier Cost Basis so we can see both settings at a glance.
Below that, show details, delete line, insert line and reprice item buttons have been reduced in size. We added a right-click popup menu to the materials grid to access the functions of those buttons that is more direct and less fussy. Show in Pricebook gives users a "drill down" into the bill of materials to show the item in the Pricebook to replace it with a neighboring item and eliminated the bookmark buttons. To add items to the list, right click the like item and select Show in Pricebook, then click the empty last item in the materials grid and select the new item(s) in the pricebook.
We
rearranged this dialog so it will fit to the left of the pricing
window. The Discount off List display is now just to the right
of Net Cost and the Save Discount button has been reduced. Markup
Setting display is now below them to fit the new format.
We've added nice new features to the price book too!
You can set the Price Book to display either List or Cost in the
right hand column by selecting Display Options. With Cost active,
cost will reflect your Supplier Cost Basis settings. If there
is no Net or discount for the item then the List price will be
displayed with "L" added.
Click the sort toggle to present the table titles in sorted/unsorted view. To jump to a particular starting letter just type the letter on the keyboard to find that item in the list! When you are using the sorted view, the table titles are changed from their familiar physical order in the price book so it takes some getting used to but you'll get the hang of it pretty fast.
Also, you'll notice the Go Back buttons have been simplified to just a left arrow although they work just the same they did before!
We have been studying and polishing this new chapter in the PricePoint saga for quite a while and we really hope you like the changes that we have made. We're so proud that our little software package is still a part of the lives of our customers after thirty one years! - Tim Clover
Revenue Report now has a report by fiscal year option. To access the new feature click the option dropdown and choose Fiscal Year Report, click the button on the the date picker and pick the start of your fiscal year. The report will show results by date and by quarter with the ending month(s) indicated by an asterisk. Thanks to Pat at Bruce Allyn Plumbing in Pamona, CA for her suggestion-Tim
Bonus Programs Enhancement: Export Invoices/Customers to Excel. Now we can filter invoices by state, township or zip code. Added Materials, Labor, Other, Tax and Total fields to report.
PricePoint's companion app, QuoteMagic! Android is now available for download from the Google Play Store.
Let me share with you a success story that shows how much impact PricePoint has had on the members of our little family. One of our long time customers (1996), Tim Sullivan developed the PricePoint advantage system for his business starting in 2014. That system became PricePoint Advantage and was the core of The PricePoint Mobile iPad application that Cloversoft produced for a number of years. As you would expect, Tim designed the system to fit the requirements of his company: a service plumbing and heating contractor in the northeastern United States. It was quite comprehensive in scope and application with hundreds of tasks and job descriptions. He has since retired, moved to the Southwest, and sold the business to his son who continues to this day. The reason that he could retire? He went flat rate for all his service work! He could arrive at the door with everything he needed to give his service customer an instantaneous price for the work they needed done all before he started the job. Under the hood, he had PricePoint's profit percentage system guaranteeing that he made a profit so he had money left over to save for vacation, kids college, etc.
Why am I telling you this and what is different now? Tim Sullivan has generously offered to allow Cloversoft the rights to distribute PricePoint Advantage however we desire and most specifically to help improve the lives and businesses of our family of subscribers. I have updated and indexed the labor rates from what they were in 2014, applying an inflation adjustment of 5% per year and applied all of the materials price changes since that time as well. What we now have is a system that will serve you well, is comprehensive and will make you a reasonable profit! Read on and you'll see where we're going with this.
You can have all the benefits of PricePoint Advantage and it won't cost you one penny more that what you already spend for your PricePoint subscription! Starting with this version of our software, you'll see a change in the big Flat Rate Book button in the middle of the Main Menu. It now has QuoteMagic! as the title, which is the new name for PricePoint Advantage. To access the complete system of flat rates, click the QuoteMagic! button to open what used to be called the Quotamatic Book then go to the utilities menu and choose Install PricePoint Advantage. PricePoint will download the system from our website. Then you can harness its power on your desktop, laptop and on a mobile device. I want to encourage each and every member of our subscriber family to get access and use it, maybe things will turn out as happily for you as they did for Tim Sullivan. - Tim Clover
NOTE: Installing QuoteMagic! Advantage will overwrite all your labor rates, supplier discounts and assemblies. To preserve this data, Follow the steps below:
Changes this month:
Bell & Gosset Hydronic Specialties –
missing items added
New Manufacturer – Intermatic water heater time switches
B&K added Batth drains and sundries
Watts- added missing ASME T&P valves
Expanded Real Prices again to CPVC sch 40 Fittings
Watts, Victaulic updated – some new items added
For more information go to Pricing
Corner
Occasionally, I'll have a discussion with a user about how to set up pricing for a particular set of items. Explaining how we set up discounts on items can be complicated although the process is pretty simple. An alternative to setting up discounts is to check the use nets box and then select Real Prices from the Supplier Net setting. To improve the accuracy of the real prices for many items in our database, the real prices for many of the above items are now coming from Hodes, an online source of plumbing materials with a long track record of competitive pricing. I'll continue to improve our Real Prices as time goes on. -Tim Clover
When entering a new customer (Invoice, Estimate, Work Order) the Cty State Zip field will incorporate a dropdown of previously entered City, State and Zip fields to pick from. You'll notice the new feature when you add a new customer in Customer Information and when creating an invoice, estimate or workorder. This good idea was suggested by Carl Lewis at Alert Plumbing in Arcadia, FL. - Tim Clover
This new version of PricePoint introduces date based deletion of obsolete attachments. To use this feature: go to Maintain, Purge Obsolete Attachments on the Main Menu bar. The dialog starts with a date that is a couple of years old.
We have made a few minor changes under the hood to make the Proposals feature more reliable. I hope this will improve your experience using PricePoint.-Tim Clover
Things keep getting more expensive! Prior to this month, PricePoint had a maximum price limit of $9,999.99. That is now increased to $999,999,99 so pricing for commercial water heaters and boilers, etc will be included in the database. We made some changes to our program that communicates with our data partner, Trade Service, that allows the transmission of prices that were previously excluded from the data we received from them.
What did I do on my summer vacation? I created a new feature called Paste Wizard in the Pricing app! What is Paste Wizard? It's a new way to bring information from your suppliers such as invoice .PDF files, and apply it to a Bill Of Materials. While you're at it, you can set your net prices for that supplier. The items you create can be linked to database items via Shortcut Code, Manufacturers Catalog# or UPC Code or they can be manually entered items if that's easier. To use it, you open up Pricing and click the Paste Wizard button.
I'm not going to go into a lot of detail here in the newsletter because I also created a set of videos on our website to teach our users how to use Paste Wizard. There's even a button that will open your browser and show you the videos! Naturally, I have also included in depth How To information in the help file that can be accessed by clicking the Help button. - Tim Clover
Go to our website www.pricepnt.com and click on the Users Corner and you'll see the buttons for the videos.
You've been able to paste quantities and shortcut codes into our pricing grid for many years now. It's part of the synergy with Excel to be able to copy the two columns in a spreadsheet and choose Edit, Paste Qty + Shortcut Code and PricePoint will find and price out the items for you. Our first improvement will allow you to use UPC rather than Shortcut code. Our second improvement will allow you to add a column of net prices from your spreadsheet.
Why am I so excited about this? For example let's say you made a purchase of fittings and you have a PDF of the invoice from your supplier. You can copy each column in the PDF: Quantity, Shortcut Code and Net and then paste it into a blank spreadsheet so the columns are in the correct order. Copy the cells in the spreadsheet, click Use Nets and set the Supplier Net Setting to the correct supplier and paste. PricePoint will prompt you to save the net price for each entry or you can push the Autosave button to save all the nets automatically!
The supplier's SC Codes probably won't match the codes that come with PricePoint so to make this work you'll need to edit the SC codes so they agree by clicking PriceBook and checking Show Shortcut codes. We added the UPC paste option so there is an alternate way of linking. The UPC code for each item is 11-12 digits and is standardized by the manufacturers. Give this a try and let us know how it works out.-Tim Clover
If your company is using a gmail address to send documents to customers, you've probably noticed that PricePoint's email sender has stopped working. Gmail now requires that you set up an App Password for PricePoint after setting up 2-step verification on your account. Follow the steps below to set up:
PricePoint software now has a page on FaceBook . We're trying to raise awareness of PricePoint and all the solutions we provide.
Hope you like us and will post some friendly hellos there. - Tim
Bug
Fixes in this IssueNone this month
We've come up with a set of lessons to help folks be more productive in the Pricing portion of the program. The new videos will play a graphical lesson with narration right on your computer that will give all users a boost! There are three tutorials available as of this date and more will be coming. To run the tutorials from the Main Functions menu click Help, Tutorials.
Just Stainless sinks. Removed obsolete and
added many new items
Anvil Gruvlock updated
B&K Plumbing Specialties added- bibbs, stops, gas valves,Check
and radiator valves
Zurn Updated a few items added
Added EEMax tankless WH
Removed Noritz from listing
Kohler brought
up to date
Viega Propress – added a few items
Checked Nibco Valves and added a few large sizes that were
missing
Deletes: Airmaster, Comfortmaker, Bohn, Slant Fin, Delta,
Copeland, Air Filters, Heat Controller, Lovejoy, Motors and Armatures
Checked Red-White found just a few not
covered
Nibco Valves added 117 large size valves
New Manufacturer – Jomar Valve 147 Items Illustrated
Checked Conbraco, Fiat Products, AY McDonald
New Commodity – Ductile Iron Waterworks Mechanical Joint
Fittings
New Items: Tyler Union MJ Ductile Iron Fittings and Municipal
Valve Boxes
Added many Nibco Press fittings and linked real prices
to Hodes where available (ongoing)
Checked Kohler Sterling SS sinks – all OK
Stockham Valves –250 new items
Legend Valve – 57 new items
Apollo Valve – 6 new
Real Prices for Nipples 1/2 thru 2” linked to Hodes
Kitz Valve – added 6 items
NEW! Lunkheimer (Cincinnati Valve) – line of industrial valves
– 500 Items
Fernco-added rubber sealing donuts
Erico/Michigan Hanger
NEW! Fisher Manufacturing- commercial and restaurant/resthome
fittings
Crane Valve: updated
Hammond/Milwaukee Valve added ball valves that were not covered in database
Brass Craft compression, flare and hose fittings added
a few hose fittings
Nibco mostly valves, some large sizes added
Deletes:
Slant-Fin
New Version
5.00 Manual
Only $48.95 + $13.00s/h
Have all the details on the new version. Call Support Services at 415-492-9211 to order your copy today!
Customer Service -
415-492-9211
E-Mail - cloversoftmail@earthlink.net
Web - www.pricepnt.com
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