We finished up 2021 with our customary year-end update that includes the new Federal and State tax tables, 1099 forms, payroll Forms 940, 941, and 943 as well as the 1094-C and 1095-C forms for 2021. 

We scurried to get changes made as soon as they were released and the GrowPoint version 21.51 just before Christmas included them all. 

The current update is available for download for customers who can log in to their accounts on GrowPointOnline.com. Those customers who are taking advantage of the immediate services that our Cloud solution provides will be updated automatically by our support staff. Many of you will return from the holidays to find version 21.51 already on your desktop.

We have been busy adding features to all aspects of GrowPoint. Here is a summary of those major enhancements in the last six months.

Payroll

Each December we send out a thorough set of documents outlining the government changes to the forms and tables supplied in the year-end update and give the payroll user detailed instructions on what they need to change in the system specific to their business. We give the changes to the FICA limit and how to install any new taxes for their state.

This year, the state of Washington created a new CARES Fund to collect premiums from employees to fund a long-term care program. It was mandated to begin on January 1, 2022, and GrowPoint was ready for it in July. However, in mid-December, the Governor of Washington suspended the program till the Washington state legislature can resolve some issues in 2022.

When they do re-instate the tax, GrowPoint users will be ready and can implement the tax at that time. Our system produces facsimiles of the payroll Forms 940, 941, and 943 which were updated to the 2021 year.

The requirements for reporting the FFCRA wages and leave on the W2 remain in place and will work this year as well. The EFW2 online submission file did not change.

We added the Gross Wages and Hours Summary report in 2020 designed to meet the needs for verification for the Payroll Protection Program Forgiveness – a program that continued into 2021. Our report lists the gross wages and hours worked for a date range by the employee and includes the last 4 digits of their SSN for IRS verification. There is an option for detail or summary by the employee. Most lending institutions are accepting it. There is also an option for export to Excel should you need to modify it.  

Accounts Receivable Orders

This summer we concentrated our efforts for several weeks in searching for speed in the sales order screen and we found it! Sometimes it is just a matter of a few tweaks internally and users were able to see a difference.

Be sure to update before you go into your spring shipping season to take advantage of the improved speed.

The Dig Method has been added to the Sales Order grid, which is a field used in a variety of ways besides digging. It was added to several processes in the system such as the SKU Level, the SKU Level Copy feature, and the SKU export function so that the information can flow.

We expanded the size of several fields across the system including the availability field, the line item description on the Sales order screen, and the grand totals on the Open Order report.

The salesman’s email address has been added to the CC and BCC fields on our email function for reports; the Reference Number to the grid and the Cost has been added to the Allocation report. Users can now also set a default order type such as Regular or Quote to a user’s settings.

The Sales Order Screen can now see newly added customers without exiting and previously used shipping addresses now default to show for date range rather than forever.

Accounts Receivable Payments/Credits

We added some fields behind the scenes to the Payment, Pre-payment, and Refund Payment processes to capture the user’s login who created, updated, or deleted those records including a field with the date and time. 

The user information now shows on the grid, however other information such as deleted records is available upon request from support if you have interest in a particular transaction.

Another big advancement for us in AR is the ability to edit selected fields on the Credit screen after saving the record.  This is a feature many users are excited about!

The Customer Balance Summary – View – now has a  Payment Drill Down to show Payment Type and the Payment Method has an option to auto-fill the deposit number with the date, the common method for numbering deposit tickets. We also added to the  Change Freight Percentage amount to Mass Customer Change application.

Inventory

As clients use fields in creative ways, we have received requests asking us to add a field here or tweak a process there. We accommodate and the results are in. 

We’ve added an optional quantity range filter to the Item List. The Actual Ready Date is now on the Quick Item Reference screen. The second Item description is now available on the Label export file and past Lot Numbers can be found by right-clicking for a lookup on that field.

The Inventory Price Import now includes the newer Excel Worksheet types. We have a new Item UPC report and the Item UPC Code Utility has a character limit to match the Item UPC limit.

Finally, our sync with GrowerOnline now wipes items from the Price/SKU level on initial sync to avoid duplications.

Accounts Payable/Purchase Order

The 1099 NEC (Non-employee Compensation) form which went into use last year as a 2 per page form, is now a 3 per page format. 

We updated GrowPoint to comply. Early this year we added the 1099 Review report which lists all Vendors who have accumulated 1099 amounts for the year, and under which form or Box code they have been collected plus a summary total of each code or format. 

This allows the GrowPoint user to review and then edit any changes that need to be made either by bringing up the paid AP transaction and editing the box code if necessary or by updating the vendor information in the Vendor maintenance file.

The Purchase Order screen now includes the Royalty per Unit and Production Item Code. Item lookups were added to the Receive To location on both the PO and the PO Receive screens.

As you can see, we’ve been busy continually improving the GrowPoint product, now entering our 40^th year of development we are still finding ways to improve and help growers manage their operations and turn plants into profits.

If you need a grower software system for your company that is well supported and regularly updated and has helpful features then reach out to our sales team and take a look at GrowPoint. 

Our team can also answer general questions about what grower technology or grower software may be best for your operation (even if it is not ours) so reach out to us with any grower software questions or request a free demo contact us.