Dynamics GP in Retail Business: Implementation and Integration Notes

>RMS to GP RM invoices), plus you should consider
If you are at the point of decision on Microsoftmoving Purchase Receipts as Inventory Assets
Dynamics GP, formerly known as Great Plainsaccounts referencing transactions from RMS to GP
Dynamics, implementation for Retailer with multiple retailon General Ledger transaction level only
stores, we would like to describe “solutions”, which 
could be deployed in your organization3.       GP Integration with MS RMS.  We are
We always recommend our customer to try to avoidoffering ready for redeployment codes, however in
risk of ERP implementation failure and the best way tothe second scenario from Paragraph 2, you could
do this is to avoid huge customizations, especially ifconsider integration from others Retail and POS
you or your current Dynamics GP Consultant orsystems: Counterpoint,  Navision Retail, POS Prophet,
Programmer never done something similar, in similarRetail Anywhere, mPower Retail, Retail Star, The
business case and in similar industry:Edge, Tylernet, or others.  The key in the integration
 design is the ability to expose Retail transactions to
1.       Retail and Point of Sale application. either ODBC, or Text file export scenarios to be
Typically this application covers Purchasing, Barcodeimported to Great Plains.  We have custom codes
labels printing, POS (Point of Sale — cashfor GP and Microsoft Retail Management System,
registers, with credit card, cash and other paymenthowever the same codes should do one way
forms capabilities, supporting POS monitors, etc.),integration to GP with minimal modification
Pricing (including items on sale, buy one get one/two 
free, etc.).  Usually the dilemma for IT and business4.       Retail business processes and
owner is this — should I keep Purchasing andrequirements are often unique and maybe dictated by
Inventory control functionality in my Retail System orindustry regulation rules: Jewelry, Food, Merchandise,
synchronize it with GP and have Great PlainsHardware, Restaurants, Gift Shops, Antiquities,
Dynamics as Master with propagating Purchasing andConsumer Electronics and Computer Parts, Online
Inventory counts back to Retail application?  In theServices, etc.  In Jewelry and Gifts we got the
case of Dynamics GP we saw a lot of integrationsimpression, that items are really unique and you have
with Microsoft RMS and in our opinion this system isto deploy GP Lot Number or Serialization and it should
very good for integration scenario, when Great Plainsbe propagated back to RMS as new item with the id
is controlling Purchasing and Inventorybeing the combination of GP Item Number and Lot
 Number suffix
2.       Modules in GP, where integration typically 
happens.  If you plan to control Inventory and5.       Barcodes.  If you are deploying
Purchasing in Great Plains, integration works in GPMicrosoft RMS, you can print your label Crystal
Sales Order Processing (moving daily Sales to GP),Reports directly from RMS Enterprise Manager or
Purchase Order Processing (moving received items toStore Operations, or you can print them from
RMS and often printing barcoding labels from GP),Dynamics GP, if you are controlling purchase receipt in
Inventory Counts and transfers between sites (movingGreat Plains.  In both scenarios you will need some
from Great Plains back to RMS).  On the other hand,custom reports design and integration into RMS or GP
if you do not plan to control Inventory Items flow in GP,user interface
then integration should only happen on Receivable 
Management module level (moving daily sales from6.