The 1st major update of Business Central is here, and updates will start from 8th April 2020.
While this update has a strong focus on “service fundamentals” (i.e. performance, reliability and support ability) there have been some nice new usability improvements that bring the web client much closer to the experience we had with old Dynamics NAV Windows client.
The below are the notable features that most users would benefit from.
To be notified by Microsoft as to when your system will get an update, please ensure that you have the appropriate people and email addresses set up in your Admin Center (see noes at the bottom of this page).
Notable new features
Recurring Sales and Purchase Lines
Very often we buy or sell similar items and services from / to vendors & customers. With the new recurring functionality, you can setup a list of commonly bought or sold items, services, etc. and have the lines of your document auto created.
This means that (for example) when you create an order for your telecoms suppler, the predefined lines will be inserted automatically. Speeding up data entry and improving accuracy.
Receive more items than ordered
An often-customised part of the software, being able to receive more than was ordered, is now standard.
In Business Central you can create ‘Over Receipt Policies’ which have a predefined tolerance percentage. Allowing you to receive that percentage over the original quantity, if desired.
Edit data more easily
To speed up data entry, the Tab key now jumps over the ellipses when entering lines of data.
Also, like in Excel, you can use the F2 key to toggle editing the whole cell or moving to the end of the text in that cell.
Cancelling Invoices against Orders
If you need to cancel an Invoice that has been matched to a Purchase or Sales Order, you can do so. The “Qty Invoiced” field will be updated to reflect this, so you can later log the correct invoice against the order.
Attach as PDF
You can now print documents to have them ‘self-attach’ the resulting PDF to the record. This is done via new “Attach as PDF” option on the Print/Send menu.
List of logged in users
From the Business Central Admin Page, you can see a list of users (sessions) and cancel any that are locking data (for example from a long running report).
Disable export of data to Excel
You can now remove the permission that allows users to export data to Excel. Once removed the users will no longer see the options to Edit in Excel or Open in Excel.
Extend Price Calculation
The current price / special price functionality has a lot of options and variations possible, but it is hard to change if it does not fit your business needs. This can now be extended with custom code much more easily.
Take pictures and the location
Developers can now allow pictures to be taken from within Business Central and access the devices Location.
This has been enabled on the Item Card in Business Central.
Integration & extending the solution
Business Central data can be selectively synchronised with Microsoft’s “Common Data Service”. The Common Data Service is a way of joining data from different systems together and keeping them in sync.
For example, this can allow your Customer Name in Business Central to update the Customer Name in your Power Apps which can then be used more simply by Power BI. Giving meaningful insight from one place, even when the data has actually arrived from multiple systems.
Control when will your system gets updated
Microsoft will be updating the Business Central tenants over the course of April and May. The typical 30-day window has been extended to 31st May 2020 due to the impact of the Corona virus on businesses.
You will get an email from Microsoft (to the people setup in your Admin Center > Notification Recipients page) that lets you know when you will be getting the update. To change this date, go to the Business Central Administration page to change the date if this is not convenient.
As this is a major update it you really need to create a new Sandbox environment and test that your data and Apps work as expected; before allowing it to update your Production (live) system.
Doing so also allow users to get familiar with the new features, in readiness for using them in the live platform.
To create a Sandbox with your data, choose ‘Copy environment’ and select production.
Once this is created and your update window has been assigned, it will be updated to Wave 1 2020 automatically (Microsoft mentioned this being done within an hour).
Otherwise, you can check and choose the upgrade time for this environment from the Admin Centre. From this page, open the Environment and select Update > Schedule Update. Then change the date to the current date and time. The update will start immediately.
Setting the update notification email lists
From the Business Central Admin Center, choose the “Notification Recipients” and Add or remove the people from the list.
