We’d like to hear from all our system users with ideas for future queries to build on the value of Enlighten. You can send your suggestions to support@sbcma.com. We’re also happy to discuss the upgrade process with CounterPro users who want to take advantage of Enlighten and the other functionality Enfinity has to offer.

18 Enlighten customizable queries are available right now. Here’s a sample snapshot of four:

Potential Income Projections: Compare operator/market activities on a trend basis. For example, see how many price quotes you gave to prospective clients in Month X of this year, compared to the previous two years. By examining the relationship between certain types of quotes and resulting revenue, you can project future revenue more accurately.

Inventory On-Yard: View all of your rental assets in real-time and see what equipment is at your business versus out on rent. Included in this query is the equipment status (ready, in repair, spare, etc.). The Inventory On-Yard query can be very helpful in making decisions to purchase or sell rental units.

Enlighten On-Yard View in Enfinity

Tax Audit Information: With many states and provinces hunting for revenue, tax audits are on the rise. Use this query to drill down to specific taxes for any given time period and list the income, taxable amount, nontaxable amount, and tax collected for each customer, contract and region.

Marketing Analysis: Find out where your revenues are coming from and create postal or email lists to mine more business from a geographic area, or earn loyalty. For example, use this query to send “thank you” cards to customers with revenues above a certain threshold within a date range you specify.

For a full list of all 18 customizable queries, or to discuss the optional Enlighten software module further, please call SBC Sales at 800.950.2221 or email sales@sbcma.com

In addition to the GPS capabilities already offered by Solutions by Computer systems, this new partnership will give our Enfinity users access to state-of-the-art data tracking capabilities that are integrated with both contract and maintenance functionalities. It opens the door to more extensive user benefits, such as tracking equipment movements outside of an expected perimeter, flagging equipment that may be over-stressed by continuous shifting between jobsites, and more proactive maintenance processes.

We have a longstanding history of integrating our systems with leading third party providers to deliver telemetry functions to our users. Our partnership with DPL America supports one of our fundamental goals, which is to offer our customers every possible asset protection.

For more information, call us at 800-950-2221.

Here are some more scenes from the show floor and the party at the Royal Sonesta …

that’s where rental operators will get a first look at Card Payment Gateway, a payment processing module for credit and debit cards that gives our Enfinity users the option of three different payment processing vendors to choose from. There’s a lot to like about Card Payment Gateway:

• Non-proprietary integration, with flexibility to “shop” three payment processors for competitive quotes and customer service capabilities.
• PCI-compliant: no card information is stored on Enfinity, which removes the system from the scope of PCI requirements.
• Signature capture automatically applies to both card and contract.
• Card is automatically used for subsequent invoices on the same contract.
• Settlements processed automatically overnight.

If you’re not going to be at the show, be sure to call us at 800-950-2221 to learn more.

Static reordering. With the static method, the system simply alerts you when your stock falls below the minimum desired level, without attempting to calculate sales volume between now and a future date (lead time). Static reordering is less proactive in terms of preventing future issues, but it’s a reliable way to restock quickly once a shortfall occurs.

Restockability. In addition to the two methods described above, Enfinity can check to see if you’ve sold enough of an item to make it worthwhile to restock. This information is found in the Restockability tab of the Inventory Purchasing screen. The numbers you enter on the tab will help eliminate the restocking of extremely slow-selling items.

Enfinity’s Restockability feature lets you pre-set X units sold in X transactions over X number of months for a given inventory item – these targets would then need to be reached before the system automatically includes the item for purchasing, regardless of the reordering method you’re using. For example, you can enter that you want your rental business to have written at least five contracts and sold ten chains for a particular chainsaw over the past twelve months before that chain would be selected for purchasing. There is a cost to stocking slow-moving inventory, and Restockability helps weed those items out.

The ratio on Enfinity’s Restockability tab is recalculated by the system automatically based on sales information; it can also be edited manually if you want to fine-tune a particular ordering model.

Royal Sonesta Hotel

First it was “save the date”… now it’s “save the details”! Here’s everything our customers need to know about Solutions by Computer’s 30th Anniversary Party  in New Orleans.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012, 6:00 to 8:00 pm

The famous Royal Sonesta Hotel, Fleur de Lis Suite

300  Bourbon Street, New Orleans

Please help us plan by emailing us your expected attendee count, or fax it to (413) 733-1684. For SBC’s Enfinity and CounterPro customers only.

Note: This event will include management’s update on 2012 developments.

Royal Sonesta New Orleans interior

“Dashboards equate to business intelligence, and intelligence is power,” says J.J. Shea, chief operating officer, Solutions by Computer. “The rental business by nature requires one decision after another, all day long. Pure data, while valuable, needs to be presented to the rental operator in ways that is immediately useful. Dashboards are good at that. Dashboards usually aggregate data and present it in graphical form, avoiding the ‘forest and trees’ problem.”

Solutions by Computer offers two types of dashboards — financial and operational. Its Enlighten module in the Enfinity software program is designed to display customer, inventory and transaction data in a dynamic, multi-dimensional presentation that makes it easy to spot relationships and trends. The user can drag, drop and rearrange elements in the display to achieve any objective, resulting in real-time results displayed in numerical or graphical form to suit the user’s preference.

“The nice thing about Enfinity’s Enlighten module is that I can adapt it,” says Rusty Parr, owner of Newhall, Calif.-based A V Party Rentals. “I can set parameters to tell me which customers have rental tickets above what revenue line, on a weekly or monthly basis. We use that information to concentrate our communications on building relationships with our best customers.”

“Reports have their place in business analysis, but they tend to be time-consuming — the rental operator usually has to wade through a lot of data to draw useful conclusions,” says Solutions’ Shea. “Dashboards get you to the finish line faster; they are a graphical summary presentation of the underlying data. While it is usually possible to drill down to the actual data, the summary gives the user a feel for the important metrics of a business, particularly when trend information is included. This can make it easier to see relationships between performance in various areas of the business.”

Indeed, huge growth in mobile connectivity allows today’s workers to spend less and less time at their desks, leading to Shea’s and others’ expectation for continued growth of mobile dashboards, particularly in the rental business. “Dashboard applications are definitely going to become more prevalent as developers explore new possibilities,” concludes Shea.

Wednesday, November 16, 2011.  2:00-3:00 PM ET

Sept. 9, 2011. If you plan on attending these industry shows, you’ll want to know where to find SBC on the show floor. Here are some booth numbers that were just assigned … stay tuned for our ARA booth number at the Rental Show, we should have that one for you in a couple of weeks:

Booth #506
The Special Event
January 24-27, 2012
Tampa Convention Center
Tampa, Florida

Booth #205
Canadian Rental Mart
March 6-7, 2012
Toronto Congress Center
Toronto, Ontario