Team Management Systems
ACOWIN
Contracting Solution for Windows
Installation and Startup Guide
Revision 2.0
Welcome to Acowin!
This booklet will take you through installing your
Acowin software, connecting your workstations,
entering your official Acowin license code, and
completing some basic accounting and company
setup. We’re going to assume that you already have
your computers networked together through
Microsoft Windows, and your printers are already properly installed. This
Installation and Startup Guide will tell you everything you need to know in order
to get Acowin up and running. Please be sure to review these pages carefully
before you begin software installation. If you have any questions about the
topics covered in this booklet, or you encounter any difficulties during software
installation, please contact Team Management Systems Support for assistance:
Team Management Systems
16520 South Tamiami Trail, Suite 207
Ft. Myers, Florida 33908
Phone: (239) 437-8898
Fax: (239) 437-9088
On the Web: www.acowin.com
E-mail: support@acowin.com
Please check out our Help and Tutorials!
This booklet is only one of the helpful resources available to you.
Acowin has an extensive Help system, which you can reach with
any of the yellow question mark buttons you’ll see on almost every
screen – there’s a big one right on the Main Menu. The Introduction to Acowin
Help chapters would be a great place to start learning about the program; they’ll
teach you about the mouse, the toolbar buttons, and other basics. Also, there is
a complete set of multi-media tutorials on your Acowin CD. They use
animation and voice narration to cover every aspect of the system, from getting
logged in and taking your first service call, to applying payments and exporting
data to your accounting software. To run the tutorials, insert your Acowin CD,
allow the install program to run, and choose Tutorials from the menu. (If the CD
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doesn’t run automatically, open up your My Computer icon, choose the CD-ROM
drive, and run the program called “launch.exe”.) The tutorial programs are selfcontained, so you can view them on any computer.
Before You Begin…
Here are some basics to keep in mind
before you begin software installation.
This software was designed for the Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows
NT, and Windows XP operating systems. The ACOWIN program has not
been tested on other operating systems. Running it under any other operating
system is not recommended by Team Management Systems.
If you are installing Acowin on a Windows 2000, NT, or XP system, it’s
important to make certain you log in as an administrator. Under these versions
of Windows, only an administrator can install new programs correctly – other
user accounts may not be allowed to do so. Any user name could be given
administrative privileges; if you’re the only person who ever uses your computer,
it’s quite possible that your normal login name is designated as an administrator.
Check with your Windows system consultants, or take a look at the User
Accounts tools in your Windows Control Panel, if you’re not sure you have
administrator access.
Windows 98 has certain file-sharing limitations that make it unsuitable for use
on a server if more than three workstations are being supported. If your network
will include more than three workstations, it is strongly recommended that you
make sure the server is running Windows 2000, NT, or XP.
The minimum workstation hardware configuration is a Pentium 200 with 32
megabytes of RAM. Every workstation should meet these minimum
requirements. Team Management Systems recommends at least 64 megabytes
of RAM and a Pentium II 450mhz or better processor in the workstations for best
performance.
The minimum server configuration is a Pentium 200 with 64 megabytes of
RAM. Team Management Systems recommends a server with at least 128
megabytes of RAM and a processor speed of 700mhz or better for best
performance. Also, see the note above concerning the use of Windows 98 on
the server.
Your Windows display must be configured to at least 800x600 pixels, with a
minimum color depth of 256 colors. To confirm or adjust these settings, click on
your Start button, then choose Settings/Control Panel/Display.
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Choose the Settings tab at the top of the Display Properties window.
The Screen Area and Colors portion of the screen is pictured below.
You can use 256 colors, High Color (16 bit), or True Color (32 bit) for
your Colors selection. The High Color (16 bit) selection is
recommended.
If you have a trial copy of the software, you’ll have 30 days to evaluate it and
make a purchasing decision. During the evaluation period, you will only be able
to run the program on a single computer, designated as a server. You cannot
connect any workstations to an evaluation copy of the program. Upon purchase
of the ACOWIN system, you’ll be given a validation code to register the software,
so that it can be used beyond the 30-day trial period. You may also purchase
workstation licenses to allow access to the same program from other computers
on your network. The entire procedure for licensing the server and workstations
is described in this guide, so if you’ve already purchased the full version of
ACOWIN and some workstation licenses, just follow these instructions. If you’re
working with a demo copy and want to obtain a validation code, contact Team
Management Systems at (800) 299-7351.
Before you can install any ACOWIN workstations, you must have an
operational Windows network. This consists of at least two Windows personal
computers, connected using network cards and a hub or switch. The computers
must be able to “see” each other across the network, meaning that if you doubleclick the Network Neighborhood icon on any of the computers, all of the
computers should appear in the resulting window. This guide presumes that you
have a Windows network up and running already. For the purposes of the
ACOWIN software, your network will be divided into a server where all the data
resides (typically the most powerful computer available to you) and a number of
workstations that access the
information. The server could
be a “dedicated” machine,
meaning nobody uses it for
anything other than storing
data, or it could be someone’s
desktop computer that you have
selected to be the server
because it’s fast and has a big
hard drive.
Regular backups are very important to safeguard your data. If your network
doesn’t already have a disk or tape backup system, you should seriously
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consider purchasing one. See the last page of this guide for a discussion of the
various backup options available.
Installing the Acowin Server Software
Your first step will be to select one of your computers to be the server, where all
your data will reside. The ACOWIN Server program will be installed on this
computer. Only one computer on your network can be installed as a server; the
rest will be workstations.
Insert the ACOWIN CD into the server’s CD-ROM drive. The
installation program should run automatically. If it doesn’t, you
can open the My Computer icon, then double-click the CD-ROM
drive. Locate the file called launch.exe on the CD and doubleclick it to run the install program.
You can click the Next button to accept all the defaults during the installation
process. Be sure to indicate that you accept the license agreement!
The program will ask if you want to install a Server or Workstation. Choose
Server.
The install program should finish without any further questions
for you. When it’s done, you’ll have a new ACOWIN icon on your
desktop. Double-click this icon to run the program for the first time.
You will be asked to enter your CD key, which should be printed
right on the ACOWIN package.
The program will notify you that you’re in demo mode, and have 30 days to
register. If you’re ready to register the full program, click the “Register” button.
The computer will display an alphanumeric Server Code and ask you to contact
Team Management Systems to obtain a final activation code. Call TMS at (239)
437-8898 and give the tech support people your Server Code; they will process it
and read you a final activation code over the phone. Once you’ve entered the
activation code, your server will be fully licensed and ready to handle
workstations.
In order for the workstations to access ACOWIN’s data, you must share the
\Acowin\Data folder on the server’s hard drive. Sharing a drive or folder makes it
available to other users across the network. If you want to share the entire drive,
open the My Computer icon, then right-click on drive C: (or whichever drive you
installed ACOWIN to) and choose Sharing.
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Select the Share As option, choose Full Access, and
click OK. To share only the \Acowin\Data folder,
locate it with My Computer, then right-click on it and
choose Sharing, as described above. A little blue
hand will appear under any shared drive or directory
in the My Computer display, to indicate that network
sharing has been enabled. The
workstations will not be able to run
ACOWIN correctly if you don’t share
the \Acowin\Data folder on the server!
Installing Acowin Workstations
After you’ve got the server up and running, you can install the ACOWIN software
on your workstations. Your software purchase will include a limited number of
workstation licenses. Contact Team Management Systems if you need to add
more workstations.
Before you can install the ACOWIN software, each workstation must be
mapped to the server’s hard disk. Mapping a shared directory creates a
permanent link between it and the workstation. The procedure for mapping a
drive was changed a bit for Windows XP. The other versions of Windows will be
discussed first, then the XP procedure will be outlined on the following page.
For Windows 98, 2000, and NT Systems: At the workstation computer, open up
the Network Neighborhood icon. Locate the server among the computers listed
in Network Neighborhood, then double-click it to reveal the list of shared
resources available.
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Right-click on the shared Acowin folder, then choose Map Network Drive. (If
you installed ACOWIN on a drive other than C:, be sure to choose the correct
disk drive.) The new drive letter you choose for the mapped resource is not
important – you can use the letter suggested by Windows.
Be sure the “Reconnect at logon” box is checked, so that the link is reestablished every time the computers are rebooted. The ACOWIN Workstation
program will not be able to access the server if you don’t map the server’s hard
disk!
Windows XP Systems: Windows XP uses a slightly different procedure to map
a network drive. Open up your “My Computer” icon – you can find it on the Start
menu, if you don’t have it on your desktop. Pull down the Tools menu, and
choose “Map Network Drive.” A dialog box will appear, asking you to select a
drive letter and enter a network path. You can click the Browse button, next to
the network path, to locate the Acowin server and its shared folder. As with the
other versions of Windows, be sure the “Reconnect at Logon” box is checked.
Once the mapped drive has been established, it’s time to install the Acowin
software. At each workstation, insert the ACOWIN disk in the CD-ROM drive and
allow the installation program to run. If the install program doesn’t run
automatically. you can manually run the program called launch.exe on the CD.
Your “My Computer” icon could be used to explore the CD and locate this
program.
From the installation program’s main menu, choose the “Install + Update”
button. You can click Continue or Next to accept all the defaults during the
installation process. Be sure to indicate that you accept the license agreement!
When the program asks if you want a Server or Workstation, choose
Workstation.
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After the install program has finished, an ACOWIN icon will be
added to your desktop. When you run ACOWIN for the first time
on a workstation, you’ll be given an alphanumeric workstation key
code. Note this code on a piece of paper and go to the server.
At the server, run the ACOWIN Registration Program, by clicking Start, then
choosing Programs / Acowin / Acowin Registration. Select the Register
Workstation tab of this program. Type in the workstation key you were given,
then click the Process button. The program will give you an activation code to
take back to the workstation. Note this code on a piece of paper.
Return to the workstation and provide the activation code it has been waiting
for. The workstation is now fully licensed and ready for use.
The Acowin Toolbar
The rest of this guidebook will take you into various setup screens in Acowin. To
help you work with these screens, it’s time to introduce you to the Acowin
Toolbar. The Toolbar is a row of buttons that appears at the bottom of every
Acowin screen. You’ll use these buttons to perform basic functions like adding a
record and saving your work. The most important Toolbar buttons are pictured
and described below. The Acowin Help system discusses the Toolbar in greater
detail – check out the Help chapter called “Acowin Basics”, or watch the Acowin
Basics multimedia tutorial on your Acowin CD.
Edit – Click this button to edit a screen and make changes to it. On many
of the setup screens described below, you’ll click Edit to “open up” the screen, fill
out the fields, and then click Save to save your work.
New – Click this button to add a new record to a file. For example, to add a
new employee to your system, you’d go to the Employee File and click the New
button.
Save – This button saves your work after you fill out a screen.
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Revert – You can click this button to abandon any changes you have
made, prior to saving, and put a screen back to the way you found it.
Exit – Clicking this button exits you from a screen and returns you to the
previous screen. If you’re adding a new record or making changes to a screen,
and you click Exit before you click Save, the computer will warn you that anything
you’ve entered on the screen will be lost.
Creating Your New Company
Your Acowin system comes with a fully-prepared company
called “Sample”. This company already has some customers,
equipment, Call Slips, and Inventory set up, along with a
complete Chart of Accounts, Distribution Codes, and System
Setup. You can immediately log into the Sample company to
test out Acowin or practice using the system – it’s a great way
to see what Acowin can do. You can initially log into the
Sample company with the user name GUEST, and the
password “password’. If you want, you can later use the
Employee File to set up additional users and passwords.
When you’re ready to start entering live data, you’ll want to create a new
company. To do this, get logged into the Sample company, then click the Setup
button on the Main Menu. This will bring up the Company Information screen,
pictured below.
Click the New button on this Company Information screen to create a
new company. The fields on the screen will become blank, ready for
you to enter your live company’s name, address, etc. The Company
Code, in the upper-right corner of the screen, is the name that will appear on the
log-in screen when you select a company. Space is provided for both a Physical
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Address and a Remittance Address; if they are both the same, you can leave the
Remittance Address fields blank.
After you finish filling out the new company information, exit from Acowin and log
back in. The new company will now appear in the pull-down menu to select a
company on the log-in screen. As with the Sample company, the initial user
name GUEST is available, with the password “password”. You can add
additional users to the Employee File and set up their passwords whenever you
want.
Remember that different companies are totally separate from one another. A
customer you enter in the Sample company will not appear in the live company.
This enables you to practice and experiment in the Sample company, without
messing up your live data. Be sure to pick the right company when you’re
logging in!
Important: For QuickBooks© 2003 (and later) Users!
Acowin uses the QuickBooks SDK (Software Developer’s Kit) to interface with
QuickBooks. This enables Acowin to send its invoices directly into the
QuickBooks system, producing a seamless transition between the two programs.
When you run the QB Sync utility in Acowin, every Acowin invoice becomes a
QuickBooks invoice immediately.
The QuickBooks SDK system has a very specific set-up procedure, which is
outlined in a separate document called “Acowin 3.0 Installation Instructions For
QuickBooks Users.” You can find this document in the “Docs” folder on your
Acowin CD-ROM. If you’re a QuickBooks user, you should carefully review those
special instructions before performing any of the Accounting setup steps listed in
this Installation Guide. Much of the accounting information will be imported
directly from QuickBooks, so you’ll be able to skip a lot of the Accounting setup.
The QuickBooks Installation Instructions basically replace the “Setting Up Your
Accounting System” section below.
Setting Up Your Accounting System
After you create your live company, you’ll want to enter your Chart of Accounts,
set up Distribution Codes, and define your accounting calendar. All of this can
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be accomplished by clicking the Accounting button on the Main Menu, then
choosing Setup.
The first order of business is to look at the Account Ranges
screen. This screen sets the beginning and ending number for
each type of account. For example, if the screen says that
Current Assets run from 1300 to 1599, then every account
number between 1300 and 1599 will be considered a Current
Asset account. Click the Edit button, adjust the Account Ranges as necessary,
and then click Save. If your account numbers don’t come in order, you can
disable this screen by removing the check mark from the Use Ranges for Chart
of Accounts? Field. This will allow you to manually select the account type for
each entry you make in the Chart of Accounts.
Next, you’ll want to set up your Chart of Accounts. This is
where you enter the account numbers that will be affected by
Acowin. For each account, enter the account number in the
“Distribution” field, and provide both a Description and a Short
Description. The Short Description is simply an abbreviated
version of the account name, used on certain reports in order to conserve space.
If you disabled the Account Number Ranges, as discussed above, you will also
need to use the pull-down menu to select an Account Type, such as Cash,
Receivables, Inventory, Current Asset, etc. It’s important to remember that only
the account numbers directly affected by Acowin need to be entered here – you
don’t have to type in your entire Chart of Accounts, which could include hundreds
of asset, liability, and expense accounts that will never be touched by Acowin.
Here are the accounts that should be entered in Acowin – for many companies,
this could be as few as a dozen account numbers:
 Your main operating Cash account
 Accounts Receivable (see note below)
 Inventory asset account
 Sales tax accrual (a Current Liability account)
 Prepayment account for customer deposits (also Current Liability)
 Any Sales Income account that would be affected by Acowin
 Any labor or material Cost of Goods account affected by Acowin
 Any Expense account you would use for discounts or writing off
uncollected debts through Acowin
A Note Concerning Accounts Receivable: Many accounting systems,
including QuickBooks ©, have strict rules and restrictions concerning imported
transactions that affect the Accounts Receivable account. It is therefore
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strongly recommended that you create a separate A/R account for use with
Acowin. For example, if your current Chart of Accounts uses account 1100 for
Accounts Receivable, you could make a new account 1101 for “Acowin A/R”.
This will keep your imported Receivables from Acowin separate from any other
Accounts Receivable you may have, and gets around any special rules for
imported A/R transactions that your accounting software might have.
Once your Chart of Accounts has been entered, you can
complete the Default Setup screen. Use the drop-down
menus at the top of the screen to select your Cash Account,
A/R Account, Pre-Pay Account, and Accounting Software.
The bottom of the screen contains your accounting calendar,
which determines the ending date for each accounting period. To set up the
calendar, click the Auto-Fill button. The system will ask you to type the security
code it displays on the screen – this is a precaution to ensure you don’t change
the accounting calendar by accident. You must type the security code exactly as
it appears on the screen, including capital letters. After providing the security
code, click Auto-Fill again. A dialog box will appear, asking you to indicate the
beginning month of the accounting year, and whether each period should end on
a fixed date, or the ending calendar date of the month. Answer these questions
and click OK to fill in the accounting calendar. Finally, enter the Current Period
number – the first period you’ll be posting any Acowin invoices into. The Auto Fill
button, security code window, and Auto Fill dialog box are pictured below.
The last important step in setting up your Accounting system
is creating Distribution Codes. These are templates of
account numbers. Each Distribution Code represents a
separate type of invoice for accounting purposes, and
specifies the income, cost, and inventory account to be used
on such an invoice. The number of Distribution Codes you need in your system
will be determined by how many different combinations of income and cost
accounts you have. For example, if all of your service calls will use the same
income and cost accounts, you only need one Distribution Code for service calls.
On the other hand, if you have different account numbers for HVAC, plumbing,
and electrical service calls, you’ll want one Distribution Code for each.
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Each Distribution Code is assigned a short name in the “Code” field, and a longer
verbal Description. When service invoices are being prepared and a Distribution
Code is chosen, the users will see both the Code and Description fields. The
account number fields should be filled out as follows:
 Material Sell = Income account for material sales
 Labor Sell = Income account for labor sales
 Tax = Current Liability account for accrued sales tax
 Discount Material = Income or Expense account for material discounts
 Discount Labor = Income or Expense account for labor discounts
 Labor, TT = Cost of Goods account for Travel Time labor
 Labor, RT = Cost of Goods account for Regular Time labor
 Labor, OT = Cost of Goods account for Overtime labor
 Labor, DT = Cost of Goods account for Double Time labor
 Inventory CR = Inventory asset account
 Cost of Goods DR = Cost of Goods account for material costs
In each of these fields, you can either type
the desired account number, or doubleclick the field to see a list of numbers to
choose from. Account numbers must be
added to your Chart of Accounts file
before they can be selected on a
Distribution Code. The system begins
with a single Distribution Code called “DEFAULT”. If you only have one set of
account numbers to handle all of your service call and contract income and
costs, you can fill out this DEFAULT Distribution Code, and it could be the only
code you ever need. If you have different income accounts for service calls and
maintenance contract income, you’d need at least two Distribution Codes – one
for the service calls, and one for contracts. If you have many different income
accounts for different types of service call and contract, you would need to
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prepare several Distribution Codes – one for each combination of income and
cost accounts. To give you an idea of how this might work, here are three
sample Distribution Codes.
This code is for installation
work.
This code is for demand service
calls.
This code is for service
agreement sales.
If your Chart of Accounts is complex enough to require several different
Distribution Codes for service calls, you should consider leaving the DEFAULT
code blank, so that no one uses it by mistake, and adding new codes for each
type of invoice you’ll be processing. As with the other topics covered in this
guidebook, you should consult the Help system, or the Accounting Tutorial on
your Acowin CD, for a more in-depth look at Distribution Codes.
General System Setup
After you finish your Accounting setup, there are a few things you
should take care of in the general system Setup area. This part of
the system is accessed by clicking on the Setup button of the
Acowin Main Menu.
The Company screen contains basic information such as your
company’s name and address. If you didn’t complete this screen
when you created your live company, you should do so now.
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The Settings screen controls the next numbers the computer will use
for invoices, customers, Call Slips, and service charges. You can
adjust these numbers to maintain continuity with your previous system. For
example, if the last invoice you generated in your old system was invoice number
5418, you can set Acowin to use 5419 as its next invoice number.
On the right side of the Settings screen are some buttons that
control miscellaneous aspects of the Acowin system. The Forms
button lets you choose a layout style for your invoices and
Purchase Orders. You can also load a logo graphic for use in your letterhead.
The Service Charges button lets you set the rules for applying
service charges to past-due invoices. You can set how old an
invoice must be before a Service Charge is applied; the
percentage used to compute the late fee; and the text messages that will appear
on Service Charge invoices. If you don’t use Service Charges, you can ignore
this setup screen.
(Optional) The Paging Fields screen determines which fields will
be sent to a technician’s alphanumeric pager when you sent out a
Call Slip with Acowin Paging, and what order the fields will appear
in. Use this setup screen to customize your pager messages and make them fit
with the capacity of your paging hardware. If you’re not using Acowin Paging,
you can skip this file.
The Labor screen contains your default average labor costs. These
costs are used when the computer figures out profitability on service
calls. Five general classes of field labor are represented: Helper1, Helper2,
Technician1, Technician2, and Supervisor. Costs can be entered for Travel
Time, Regular Time, Overtime, and Double Time.
Each set of labor costs consists of a base pay rate
and a burden, which you can enter as a percentage or
a dollar amount. Burden represents the employer
overhead on labor, and includes such costs as FICA
and Medicare, federal and state unemployment tax,
and insurance. Note: the Employee file has a cost screen for each employee,
which can over-ride the figures on this default Labor Cost screen – this is more
accurate than using the default costs for everyone, but of course it takes more
work to calculate individual costs for each technician.
The final screen of the Setup module is called Subsystems. This
screen is filled with buttons that give access to many different files.
The contents of these files appear as drop-down menus throughout the Acowin
system. Subsystems is where you can “tweak” Acowin to suit your tastes. Most
of these files can be accessed “on the fly” by right-clicking on the dropdown menus, elsewhere in the system. For example, you can add new
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Problem Codes as you go, by right-clicking the Problem Code drop-down menu
that appears on the Call Slips. For this reason, you don’t have to address all of
the Subsystems files right away – you’ll be able to deal with them as you
encounter them later. Here are some suggestions for Subsystems files you
might want to take care of right now:
Contract Types – these are the types of maintenance agreement,
or service contract, that your company sells. You can build quite a
bit of information into the Contract Types – you should review the
Help chapter on Contracts, or watch the Contracts tutorial on the Acowin CD,
before you try to set these up.
Departments – if you’re going to divide your company into
departments, you’ll want to get them set up before you add anyone
to the Employee File. Using Departments is optional.
Dispatchers – this file is very important! It controls which
technicians appear on the Dispatch Board for each Acowin user.
Everyone who will use the Acowin program should be added to the
Employee File first, then given an entry in the Dispatchers file. We’ll take a
closer look at Dispatchers when we discuss the Employee File in the next
section.
Paging Carriers – (Optional) if you’re using the Acowin Paging
option, you should add your paging carriers and their modem phone
numbers to this file. When you add technicians to the Employee
File, you’ll indicate which Carrier they use, and enter their personal pager phone
numbers.
Rate Types – this file contains your Time & Material billing
schedules. Each Rate Type includes markups for materials, hourly
billing rates for labor, and possibly a minimum charge. You can
create as many different Rate Types as you need.
Tax Regions – each Tax Region is a combination of local, city,
county, and state taxes. The computer uses these tax rates to
compute sales tax on your invoices. If you collect only state tax on
your invoices, you would only need two Tax Regions – one for state tax, and one
for tax exempt customers, such as churches. On the other hand, if you have a
lot of different city and local taxes to deal with, you might need many Tax
Regions. The Customer/Site File has a field that tells the computer what Tax
Region applies to each work site.
Zones – these are portions of your dispatching area, usually
determined by geography. For example, everything north of a
certain river might become the “North” zone, while everything east of
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town might become the “East” zone. The Zone system helps dispatchers quickly
determine which technicians are closest to each work site. The Zone where
every service call is located can be clearly seen on the Dispatch Board. As you
add customers to your database, you’ll build a file of Zip Codes, and each Zip
Code can be included in one of your Zones. This way, the computer will
automatically assign a Zone for new work sites, as soon as you enter their Zip
Codes.
Adding Employees To Your Employee File
With Accounting and some general System Setup completed,
your final step before going “live” with Acowin will be adding your
employees to the Employee File. Anyone whose labor can be
applied to service calls, and anyone who will be an Acowin
system user, should receive an entry in the Employee File. The basic employee
information is self-explanatory: first and last name, address, phone number, etc.
Most of the fields on the main Employee screen are optional, so if a particular
piece of information is not relevant or you don’t know the answer, leave it blank.
Here are the most crucial fields to complete:
 First Name
 Last Name
 Paging Carrier and Number (if using Acowin Paging)
 Employee Number
 Name Code
 Employee Type
Employee Type must be set to Technician, Helper, or Installer if the employee
will be working as a technician.
The Name Code will be the name that appears on the Dispatch Board, if the
employee is a technician; also, if the employee is an Acowin system user, the
Name Code will be their login name.
If the employee will be using the Acowin system, click the Password
button. Enter and re-type a password for the employee, as
requested. The employee will need their Name Code and this Password in order
to log in. You can click the Password button again to change the employee’s
password at any time.
If the employee will be an Acowin user, and plans to use the
Dispatch Board, you must also create a Dispatchers File entry for
them. To reach the Dispatchers File, click Setup, then choose
Subsystems, then click on Dispatchers. Click the New
button to add a new entry to the file. The computer will show
you a list of employees. Choose the person you want to
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make into a dispatcher, then select an Available Tech and click the down-arrow
button to add them to the Assigned Techs list. Repeat until all desired
technicians are on the Assigned list, then click the Save button. The order in
which you select the technicians will determine the order they appear on the
Dispatch Board – the first tech you add to the Assigned list will be the first tech
you see on the Dispatch Board, etc. If you already have some Dispatchers set
up, you can copy an existing Dispatcher’s list with the Duplicate button. A user
who has no entry in the Dispatchers file will not see any technicians when they
run the Dispatch Board!
Department Assignment (optional): If you’ve chosen to divide
your company into departments, you can use the Departments
screen of the Employee File to determine which departments each person
belongs to. A single employee could belong to several different departments,
and could even be classified as a technician in some, while being only a helper in
others. Your list of available departments (from Subsystems) will appear on the
left side of this screen. Edit the screen, then select a department and use the
right-arrow button to move it to the employee’s assigned departments in the righthand column. Everyone is initially assigned to a department called “Default”,
unless you use this screen to make different choices. After assigning a
Department, you can click on the Detail button to set technician skill level. The
system assumes each employee is a “Tech1” in their assigned Departments,
unless told otherwise.
Individual Pay Rates (optional): One of the screens you
addressed in System Setup was the Labor screen, which sets the default
average hourly costs for technicians in the field. If you wish, you can set
individual costs for each employee, using the Pay Rates screen of the Employee
File. Individual Pay Rates are optional, but obviously much more accurate than
using the global default average costs for everyone. The Pay Rates screen
initially displays a message reminding you that the default rates from Setup are in
effect:
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To set individual labor costs for this employee, click the Edit button, then place a
check mark in the box called Unique Rates for this employee. The screen will
change to look like this:
You can now enter the specific hourly pay rate and burden for this employee.
Burden can be entered as either a percentage or a flat dollar amount. The
example pictured above shows a technician who makes $15.00 per hour base
pay, plus a burden that begins as 45% on regular time, and is reduced slightly for
overtime and premium time.
Congratulations! You’re ready to begin using Acowin!
If you’ve followed the steps in this handbook, your live
company is now fully configured and ready to go. You
can start adding customers, taking service calls, and
producing invoices. Here are a few parting thoughts,
reminders, and bits of advice for you as you begin to
explore the Acowin system.
Be sure you create a Dispatcher entry for everyone who will use the
Dispatch Board, listing the technicians who should appear on the Dispatch Board
for that user. If a user without a Dispatchers File entry runs the Dispatch Board,
they will not see any technicians! The Dispatchers file can be found by
clicking the Setup button on the Main menu, then choose Subsystems, then click
Dispatchers.
Once you have users and passwords entered into the system, be sure to log
out as “GUEST”, and log back in under your personal user name. The “GUEST”
user name is only meant to be used when you’re first setting up the system, and
possibly under unusual circumstances in the future (if everyone forgot their
passwords, you could log in as “GUEST” to assign new passwords, for example.)
You shouldn’t use the “GUEST” user name for everyday activities – among other
things, the “GUEST” user probably doesn’t have an entry in the Dispatchers file,
and thus would not see any technicians when running the Dispatch Board.
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Use the Help system! You can run Help right from the Start menu
(Start/Programs/Acowin/Acowin Help) and keep it on your desktop at all times,
while you’re getting used to the new system. Later, you can pull up Help from
within the ACOWIN program whenever you need it, using the Help pull-down
menu at the top of the screen.
Every new user should read the “Acowin Basics” book of the Help system,
before they get started. These Help pages explain the toolbar buttons and other
bread-and-butter concepts of the system.
Most new users should learn how to add Customer / Site File entries first,
then learn how to add Call Slips. This way, everyone will be able to answer the
phone and take a service call when you get busy. These two files are also great
ways to cut your teeth on the new system - just about all of Acowin’s features can
be found on those screens. You can let new users log into the Sample company
to practice, since Call Slips and invoices added to the Sample company will have
no effect on your live company data.
It’s important for users to log out of the system when they’re finished using it
for the day. There are three ways to log out:
 From the ACOWIN Main Menu, click the “Exit” button.
 Pull down the File menu at the top of the ACOWIN window, then choose
Quit.
 Click the standard Windows close button (the “X”) at the top-right corner of
the ACOWIN window.
If your users don’t log out correctly, your workstation licenses may not be
released. In other words, the system might still think they’re logged in. This
could happen any time a workstation is rebooted or shut down without the user
logging out of ACOWIN – a sudden power failure, for example. If you find
yourself in a situation where one of the workstation licenses is hung up, you can
release it from the server, as follows:
 Click the Start button, then choose Programs/Acowin/Acowin Registration.
This must be done at the server.
 Select the Release License tab. You’ll see a list of workstations that the
system believes to be in use.
 Pick the license you wish to release and click the “Release” button.
NOTE: if you do this to someone who really is on-line and working, you’ll
kick him off the system. You should only release licenses that are truly
“stuck”. It might be a good idea to ask everyone to log out, just to be on
the safe side, then release any licenses that remain.
As you make your way through the system, you’ll run into pull-down menus
that contain lists of choices. Most of these lists are maintained in the
Subsystems menu of the Setup file. You can add new choices to almost any
pull-down list by right-clicking your mouse on the field. For example, if you’re
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setting up some Equipment and you need to add a new Brand, you could rightclick on the Brand field. You should be able to build most of your pull-down lists
as you go, using this approach.
Be sure to back up your data regularly! At a minimum, you should prepare
a complete backup of the C:/Acowin folder on the server every night. If you keep
data from several shared programs on the server, you should back up the entire
server every night. There are several hardware options for making backups:
 Floppy disks are inexpensive, and every computer has a floppy disk drive,
but you’ll find they are too cumbersome to rely on in an office environment
– backing up your entire server this way would probably require dozens of
disks and a substantial amount of time.
 ZIP and Jaz drives, manufactured by Iomega, provide high-capacity
reusable disks that can be created much faster than floppy disk backups,
with fewer disk swaps. A single ZIP disk can do the work of almost 70
floppy disks, and the more expensive Jaz disks are even larger.
 CD-R drives can write a large amount of data to a special type of compact
disk. The disks can only be written once, but they are inexpensive, and
each one stores a great deal of data – about 500 megabytes each,
meaning a full backup of your server should require only a few disks at
most, and might easily fit on one. Using CDs for backups is very fast, and
the resulting backup disks are durable and easy to store.
 Tape drives can produce “unattended” backups – the backup software is
instructed to run overnight, and the entire backup fits on a single tape.
You can purchase tape drives with many different speeds and capacities.
With a high-capacity tape drive, you could back up both the server and
selected data from all across your network, such as everyone’s
spreadsheets and word processing documents, every night.
Be sure to take advantage of the ACOWIN Tutorials, which you can access
from the main menu of your ACOWIN CD-ROM. These multimedia tutorials offer
a guided tour of the entire system, broken down into short, easy lessons. The
Setup tutorial covers all of the setup tasks outlined in this booklet. You can bring
the ACOWIN disk home and watch the tutorials at your convenience – they
should run fine on almost any Pentium-class Windows computer. You will need
a sound card and speakers to hear the spoken-voice portions of the tutorials.
It is strongly recommended that you install a battery backup on all of your
Acowin computers, both server and workstations, to reduce the risk of damage to
your data during power failures and brown-outs. You should also connect your
network hub or router to a battery backup. Since Acowin is a multi-user network
application, power failures that knock out the computers, hub, or router could
cause damage to your data. Battery backups are very affordable, and can be
purchased from any computer or office supply store. A few dollars invested in
battery units will protect your computer hardware and valuable data!
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