The Business Master (3rd Edition)

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PropMan Residential Property Management Software Reference Manual for Shareware Property Management System PropMan Reference Manual (C) Copyright 1991 by G. Curtis Feger PropMan Software (C) Copyright 1991 by G. Curtis Feger (C) Copyright 1986,1988 by G. Curtis Feger / Jeffrey G. Gobel PropMan Property Management Software 309 S. Ynez Ave. Monterey Park, CA 91754 (818) 570-1071 Copyright PropMan software is copyrighted. This Reference Manual is copyrighted. Illegal copying of either is a violation of both criminal and civil law. Shareware This manual and the accompanying software are distributed as shareware. They may be freely copied and shared with the following conditions: 1 No charge may be made for the software or manual. A nominal charge may be made to cover the costs of disk duplication. 2 The entire system, including the software and documentation, must be distributed without modification. 3 The manual may only be distributed in computer readable form. Printed copies of the manual may not be reproduced in any way. Table of Contents SECTION Page 1 Read Me First 1 - 1 2 Using PropMan 2 - 1 3 General Information 3 - 1 4 Menus and Screens 4 - 1 Main Menu 4 - 3 Daily Operations 4 - 4 Month End Operations 4 -18 On Demand Operations 4 -26 System Maintenence 4 -31 Reference Listings 4 -46 Archive Review 4 -50 Payroll / Employee 4 -56 New System Setup 4 -59 5 Errors 5 - 1 APPENDICIES A Installing PropMan A - 1 B Archiving and Backups B - 1 C Menus and Screens C - 1 D Freeform Letters and Notices D - 1 E On Screen Calculator E - 1 F Error Messages F - 1 INDEX A NOTE CONCERNING THIS SHAREWARE MANUAL This manual is ASCII text exported from the word processing system used to format and print our printed manuals. The only control characters are CR/LF and FF. Because of the varying type sizes and page layouts in the printed manuals, the pagination and margins may look odd when printed on an 80 column printer. We have kept the original page breaks and numbering in order to maintain the usefulness of the index. 1 - 1 Read Me First The PropMan residential property management software was designed specifically for property owners and managers. It provides these people with an accounting system to handle financial information and tenant records in a consistent manner for all properties under their control. Yet it keeps the information separate for each property for individual reporting and income and expense analysis. PropMan has a context sensitive Help function built in. Anytime PropMan is in use, one or two keystrokes will bring instructions to the screen (See HELP - F1 in the next section). In addition there are two printed manuals: a step by step User Guide and a Reference Manual. USER GUIDE The PropMan User Guide is a tutorial. It will help you get started quickly with PropMan. It is designed to lead the user through specific operations, such as moving in a tenant or entering an invoice, one step at a time. The instructions in the User Guide do not always address every field on every screen. They are keystroke by keystroke instructions for the particular operation. In an afternoon you can begin using PropMan. The User Guide will teach you how to use features as you need them. REFERENCE MANUAL The Reference Manual gives detailed information on how the PropMan program works. An overview of the program and the organization of the accounting data are described. The major part of the book is a detailed description of the format of each display screen and the use of each field. The Reference Manual also contains the system error messages and some computer operation considerations. Organization of the Reference manual The section "Using PropMan" explains starting and stopping PropMan. It also explains the built-in Help and how the Menus and Function Keys are used to control PropMan's actions. If you are already familiar with computers, this section will help you begin operating the PropMan system. 1 - 2 The "General Information" section covers the accounting and record keeping done by PropMan. This will introduce you to the terms and concepts involved and also explain the over-all organization of PropMan. "Menus and Screens" is the detailed description of each field on each display. The section "Errors" describes the types of error indications used by PropMan. The Appendices contain information that some persons may find helpful. Appendix A - Installing PropMan explains how to install the system in your computer. Appendix B - Archiving and Backups discusses what these operations are, why and how often they should be done. Appendix C - Menu and Screen Displays contains copies of the various displays used by PropMan. Appendix D - Free Form Letters and Notices explains how to write custom notices or mass mailings. Appendix E - On Screen Calculator explains the operation of the built in calculator. Appendix F - Error Messages is an alphabetical list of the error messages. Appendix G - License Agreement is a copy of the agreement under which you use PropMan. If PropMan has been installed on your computer, you can continue now with the next section, "Using PropMan". If it has not been installed, turn now to Appendix A for installation instructions. 2 - 1 USING PropMan This section is an introduction to the actual operation of the PropMan system. Experienced computer users can use this to get started quickly on the PropMan system. It will show you how to start and stop the system, how to ask PropMan for help and how to read the displays. If possible follow along on the computer. Figures referred to in this section are in Appendix C. For more information on specific displays see Section 4. Or, if you are running the PropMan program, use the Help function, covered below in this section, to call up reference material on how to use the system. If you are less familiar with computers or if you want instruction on a particular operation see the User Guide. PropMan uses Menus and Function Keys to control its operation. The Menus are lists of operations or categories of operations that can be performed. Function Keys are used to request certain features, select various options, and to move between related data displays. STARTING PropMan The computer must always be set with the current date and time when running PropMan. If these are incorrect, PropMan can make serious miscalculations. If you used the standard PropMan installation the following steps will start PropMan. From the main or root directory, type in the command PROPMAN (note: all one word) and press the Enter or Carriage Return key. The PropMan system will load and then display the Main Menu. If your office has decided to use a menu system or different command or procedure to call up PropMan, the blank space after the next paragraph would be a good place to write that procedure for future reference. Our command for PropMan is: 2 - 2 STOPPING PropMan PropMan uses a single key for all exits or ends. The Escape key (Esc) exits whatever operation is being performed at the time. An Escape from a data entry screen redisplays the menu that the screen was selected from. Escape during a Help display removes that display. An Escape from a menu causes a redisplay of the next higher menu, until, at the Main Menu, Escape will cause the PropMan system to stop running and return control to DOS. Escape is not a break or a reset. It is the normal exit for all operations. It will NOT stop in the middle of interconnected operations. It will exit a report screen at the end of a report or exit a data entry screen after saving data. But it will not leave a building half initialized or leave accounting information partially updated. NEVER RESET, RE-BOOT or SHUT OFF your computer while PropMan is running. Always use the Escape to exit completely from PropMan, then shut down the computer. If power is lost while PropMan is running, it may cause no problem; it may cause some minor data loss; or it may cause serious errors in the record keeping. There is no way to tell until the system is restarted and the data examined in detail. If a power failure occurs while PropMan is running the wisest action, by far, is to restore the system from the most recent backup and re-enter the lost data. This is an important reason for making regular system backups (see Appendix - B). HELP - F1 Figure C-2 (Appendix C) shows the Help displays. The HELP function is a reference manual that is available at all times. For HELP press the F1, or Function 1, key. Anywhere in the system, help may be requested and the reference material for the current screen will be displayed. Even novices can use any of PropMan's features very easily by selecting the desired features and then accessing these built in instructions. When F1 is first pressed a graphic display of the function keys is shown on the screen. (Only F1 is discussed here, the function key display and the remainder of the function keys are covered later in this section under "FUNCTION KEYS "). The key display will vary but the key F1 is always labeled MORE. For MORE help press F1 a second time. The key display is removed and a window appears on the screen. PropMan will begin to display information about the current cursor position. On menus, an explanation is given of what will happen if the action at the cursor location is selected. On data entry or display screens, detailed information is given about the data at the cursor 2 - 3 location. HELP will also explain how this data relates to other data on the screen or to data on other screens. Often there is more than a single window-full of information. In this case, the word "MORE" is shown as the last word on the last line in the window. Press F1 to see the next window-full of material. This can be continued until all windows have been seen, or can be stopped. Use the Escape key to exit the Help operation at anytime. When an operation is to be performed, Help can be requested on the various menus to locate the correct section of PropMan. Help can then be requested from the data screen itself to lead the operator through the process. Anytime there is any question about where you are, what is needed or how to do some operation, first press F1. SCREEN DISPLAYS Figure C-1 (Appendix C) shows the general screen format. Always shown at the top of the screen are the system owners name, the current processing month or archive review month the current date and time. Most of PropMan's operations are performed on a single building at a time. During these operations, the building number and name also are in the heading. The middle portion of the screen contains the menu or data entry display for the particular PropMan activity in progress. At the bottom of each screen are two message lines. The last line is a data entry prompt. It specifies the type of input allowed at the current cursor position. The line above these prompts is for error messages. When an entry is rejected PropMan will tell you why. Error messages are removed when the next key is pressed. See section 5, Errors and Appendix F, Error Messages. MENUS PropMan has small and relatively few menus. This is because PropMan performs so many actions automatically, based on data entered by the user. These automatic actions do not need to be specifically requested from a menu. Menus are used to select the kind of operation to be performed or the kind of data to be entered. Menu items are grouped according to how often they are needed. In general, items used together are grouped together and the most common items are displayed first. 2 - 4 The first, Main Menu (figure C-3), allows selection of the general area of activity such as Daily or common activities, Month end activities, System activities for background data maintenance and so on. Each of the selections from the Main Menu leads to another menu. The selections from these second level menus lead to the screens used to enter data and control operations. Notice that the data entry prompt at the bottom of the menu screen tells how to select an item from the menu. Move the cursor by using the up and down arrows or by keying the first letter of the desired item. Then press the Enter or Carriage Return key. The next menu or a data display will appear. For more information about any of the menu selections, move the cursor to that selection and call up HELP by pressing the F1 key. DATA ENTRY SCREENS / CONTROL SCREENS After the desired action has been selected from the menus, you can begin reviewing or entering data, or start the desired operation. It is these screens that do the work of PropMan. Examples: 1) To work on payables, select "Daily operations" from the Main menu (C-3); select "Invoices" from the Daily menu (C-4). The Invoice data entry screen (C-5) is displayed. You may now review, add or change invoices. 2) to close out the accounts at month end, Select "Month end operations" from the Main menu (C-3); select "Close out accounts" from the Month end menu (C-13). The Month end close screen (C-17) is displayed. You may now initiate the month end close operation. COLOR USAGE PropMan does not require a color display but is designed to take full advantage of color if it is available on your system. For a complete description of the color coding scheme and color selection, see the System Parameters screen in Section 4; or select "System maintenance" from the Main menu, select "System parameters" from the System maintenance menu, move the cursor to the Colorset and Color items and ask for HELP (use F1). See figure C-38. Color coding is used to show different categories of information in different colors. The operator can tell at a glance what type of information is being displayed. For example, colorset number 3 uses the full range of color coding available. The examples here refer to figure C-5, an Invoice screen. When using this colorset the screen and menu titles are in bold colors to set them off from the data. The labels identifying the data are in white (ie. "Invoice Number:", "Distribution Amount") and the data itself is in black (ie. "6", "500.00"). 2 - 5 In addition, there are two kinds of data being displayed. Data that can be directly entered or changed from the current screen is black on a white background (ie. invoice amount, distribution account number). There is also data that is calculated by PropMan for display only. This is black on a green background (ie. vendor name, on hold date). The cursor will not move to every position on the screen. It moves only to those items that may be entered or changed. Data for display only is inaccessible. This may be historical data or data calculated by PropMan. Data that is accessible at one time may not be accessible at another. On the Invoice screen most of the data on the screen can be accessed anytime until the invoice is paid. After payment no changes may be made at all. This distinction between accessible data and display only data is one use of the color coding. When using colorset number 3, mentioned above, positions where the cursor will move are the black data on white background. The remainder of the data is black on green background. As the status of the data changes between accessible and inaccessible, the color coding will change also. ENTERING AND CHANGING DATA The same data display screens are used to enter new data and to change data previously entered. To enter new data a "NEW" or blank screen is called up. To change existing data, the data is called to the screen and the new values entered. For instructions go to the desired screen and ask for HELP (use F1). Information may be entered in any sequence. The enter (or Carriage Return), the forward and backward tab and the up, down, left and right arrow keys are used to move the cursor around the screen. As each item is entered it is edited. Any errors are rejected immediately by PropMan. If an entry impacts other data on the screen that data will be changed as necessary to stay in step. The user may make as many changes as desired on the screen. As long as the data remains on the screen no permanent changes have been made. Then, when the operation is terminated or a new display is called for, PropMan saves the final values. No special command is needed to save the data. If you enter or change data on a screen and then leave the screen, PropMan assumes that the data is to be saved and acted upon. Up until the time this save takes place the user may cancel all of the changes they have made and redisplay the original data (see "Function Keys" below). As soon as data is saved by PropMan, it is reflected in all appropriate areas of the system. No further operations or instructions are required to tell PropMan to process the information. As an example, when the receipt of a deposit is entered on the Tenant Financial screen, all of the following 2 - 6 items will immediately have new values to reflect this deposit: the tenant's deposit balance, the building's deposit balance, the building's deposit income account, and the owners earnings. This is done for both current month and year-to-date values. FUNCTION KEYS Function keys are used to manipulate data on a screen and to move between screens that contain related data. They control actions that immediately operate on the screen or on data being displayed. The function keys give flexibility and control over the detailed actions of PropMan. PropMan recognizes two different function key layouts. The IBM XT style keyboard has keys marked F1 through F10 on the left side of the keyboard. The IBM AT style keyboard has keys marked F1 through F12 across the very top of the keyboard. The keyboard style is specified on the System parameters screen. All of the functions are available on either keyboard. The uses of the particular keys are not the same, however. The descriptions below show how to use the functions from either keyboard. Figure C-2 shows the Help display of the function key layout. The functions and keys: 10 Key 12 Key F1 - Help - F1 The HELP function is a reference manual that is available at all times. When F1 is first pressed, a graphic display of these function keys is shown on the screen. Not every key is labeled every time. Keys F1, F2 and Esc are always labeled and always active. The labels for keys F3 through F10, are determined by the cursor position. Only active keys are shown and the labels on the keys vary with the screens and fields being entered. Pressing F1 a second time calls up more detailed information about the current activities (see "HELP - F1" above, in this section). When using Help remember to use the Esc key to exit from the Help function before pressing another function key. 10 Key 12 Key F2 - Calc - F2 Calls a three memory calculator onto the screen. This is available at all times and can be moved to any spot on the screen. See Appendix E. 2 - 7 10 Key 12 Key F4 - Clear "field" - F9 F6 - Restore "field" - F10 In operation, "field" is replaced by the actual name of the field at the current cursor location. A field is any one thing of interest. The Building Number is a field. The Building Name is a field. Each line in an address is a field, as are phone numbers, tenant names, and so on. The Clear function sets the field to zeros or blanks as appropriate. The Restore function sets the field back to its most recently saved value. These keys are active only when the cursor is on a data field. 10 Key 12 Key F3 - Clear screen - F5 F5 - Restore screen - F6 A screen displays a group of fields that pertain to each other. The Clear function sets all fields on the screen to blank or zero. Remember the original values are not lost until new values are stored when you leave the screen. The Restore function discards all of the data on the screen and sets all fields back to their most recently saved values. These keys are only active on data entry screens. 10 Key 12 Key F7 - "Previous type" screen - F3 F9 - "Next type" screen - F4 In operation "Previous type" and "Next type" are replaced by the actual names of the screens. Some groups of related data are so large that they will not fit on a single display. In these cases multiple screens are used. The screen type is the name of the format or layout of the screen. For example: PropMan records three screens (three different screens-full) of information about each tenant, the Tenant Financial activity, Tenant Payment History and Tenant Personal information screens (see figures C-6,7,8). When Tenant Activity is selected from the Daily menu, the Tenant Financial activity screen is displayed. Using the Help function (press F1) displays the function keys. The Previous Type key is labeled "Prsnl scrn"; the "previous type" of screen is the Tenant Personal information screen. The Next Type key is labeled "PmtHst scrn"; the "next type" of screen is the Tenant Payment History screen. These keys are only active if there are multiple screen types. When there are, the titles of the screens include a note such as "(Tenant scrn 1 of 3)" as a reminder that the other screens are also available. 2 - 8 10 Key 12 Key F8 - Previous "screen" - F7 F10 - Next "screen" - F8 In operation "screen" is replaced by the actual name of the screen. These functions do not change the screen format. They allow calling the next or previous group of information with the same format. Whatever is named in the title of the screen is the group these functions operate on. Examples: 1) in the Vendor List the next or previous vendor's data will be shown; 2) on a unit screen, data about the next or previous unit will be shown. These keys are only active when such data exists. 10 Key 12 Key F8(Shift) - Previous "field" - F9(Shift) F10(Shift) - Next "field" - F10(Shift) In operation "field" is replaced by the actual name of the field at the current cursor location. When these functions are available, the "field" name used here will be the same as the "field" name used for the Clear "field" and Restore "field" functions. On some screens there are fields whose values have an inherent sequence of their own, independent of the other data on the screen. The Next and Previous "field" functions allow these fields to be stepped through their values. Examples of these fields: 1) the Account Corrections are in order by correction number but on that screen Acct can be stepped through in sequence (... 1430, 1440, 1450, ... ) for any correction (see figure C-25); 2) Invoices are in order by invoice number but on that screen Vendor can be stepped through in vendor number sequence 1, 2, 3, ... for any invoice (see figure C-5); 3) data for tenants is kept in order by unit but on the Tenant Financial screen the Tenant Name can be stepped to see previous tenants in the same unit (see figure C-6). These keys are only active if the cursor is on a field that has such stepping. Whenever these functions are available the Input Message includes the note "(Prev/ Next)" to remind you. 2 - 9 10 function key keyboard: * Always available: Esc - Escape F1 - Help F2 - Calculator * Available during data entry: F4 - Clear "field" F6 - Restore "field" F3 - Clear screen F5 - Restore screen F8 (shift) - Previous "field" (some fields) F10 (shift) - Next "field" (some fields) * Available when multiple displays exist: F7 - "previous type" screen F9 - "next type" screen F8 - Previous "screen" F10 - Next "screen" 12 function key keyboard: * Always available: Esc - Escape F1 - Help F2 - Calculator * Available during data entry: F9 - Clear "field" F10 - Restore "field" F5 - Clear screen F6 - Restore screen F9 (shift) - Previous "field" (some fields) F10 (shift) - Next "field" (some fields) * Available when multiple displays exist: F3 - "previous type" screen F4 - "next type" screen F7 - Previous "screen" F8 - Next "screen" 3 - 1 GENERAL INFORMATION This section describes the record keeping and accounting done by PropMan. Its purpose is to explain PropMan as a rental management system without getting overly involved in the details of the computerization or computer operation aspects. The Registered version of the PropMan Property Management System is designed for use by persons who are not accountants but who manage their own property and keep their own financial records. PropMan keeps information at several levels. Some is universal, used for all buildings, tenants, etc. in the system. Other information is building specific. And other information is recorded on a per unit or per tenant basis. Processing month PropMan operates on a business month cycle independent of the actual calendar date. There is only one current processing month for all buildings in the system. All transactions are recorded as business in the current Processing Month, even if the transaction is given a different date when it is entered. When the months business is complete the month is closed and the next month becomes the current processing month. A new PropMan system may be started with an initial processing month as far in the past as desired. A months data can be recorded and the month closed. The next months data recorded and the month closed, and so on, until the system is brought current. UNIVERSAL DATA Each building is a completely separate accounting or financial entity. Buildings have unique numbers between 100 and 999. The system will track up to 50 units. This may be one 50 unit building or several smaller buildings. In PropMan a vendor is anyone to whom invoices are charged. There is a single vendor file used by all buildings. The file can have 9999 vendors. You may use different vendors for each building if desired, but they will all be kept in one file. PropMan assigns vendor numbers in sequence. PropMan has a Common chart of accounts to define the names and numbers of the accounts. Each building has separate financial 3 - 2 information but uses the same categories to organize it. For example, account 1510, and every other account, will have the same name in the financial statements of every building. But, it will have a different value for each building, reflecting the expenses for that building in that account. In the Chart of Accounts, accounts are numbered from 1200 to 2850 by 10's. The even hundreds are summary accounts and their names cannot be changed. The remainder are detail accounts. Most detail account names can be changed at will. PropMan operates by account number so charges to an account (1580 or 1310 or any other) remain charges to that account independent of any name it might be given. All accounting charges are made to the detail accounts. Summary accounts cannot be charged directly. Their value is always the total of all of their detail accounts. The detail accounts with fixed names have fixed uses. PropMan must have these accounts available to use as part of its automatic operations. Most of the mortgage expense accounts, some of the income accounts and a few others are fixed. The numbered accounts are all monthly activity accounts. They have no running balance. In addition to these are 15 balance accounts. There are 5 mortgage principal, 5 deposit, and 5 reserve balance accounts. These balance accounts keep running balances for the income and expense transactions in their corresponding activity accounts. For example; activity account 2010 1st Trust Deed Principal records how much was paid toward the principal in a given month, and the balance account 1st Trust Deed Balance is the amount still owed. BUILDING INFORMATION A building is the major entity around which PropMan is organized. Each building's financial records are separate from all others. Buildings may use the same vendors, but are not required to. When a building is entered in the system, the user assigns a number in the range 100-999. They may be assigned in any order desired but must be unique. For each building there is a physical description and information on reserves, mortgagees and so on. There is a list of the units in the building and a list of tenants for each unit. Each building has its own invoices, corrections and its own year-to-date and month-to-date accounting data and archives. The building is an accounting grouping. If several physically distinct buildings are to be grouped and run as a whole, you may call them by a single building number and use the unit IDs to 3 - 3 identify them. The opposite is also true. If accounts are to be kept separate for different portions of a single site, it may be entered as several buildings with each containing only a portion of the units. Buildings may have a status of NEW, ACTIVE or DELETED. A building is NEW when it first entered in the system. Background information may be entered about the building, its units and tenants but no financial activities take place. An ACTIVE building is an operating building. All normal rental activities take place. A DELETED building has no further activity. Its data may be examined and listed but no transactions are accepted. UNIT INFORMATION The unit information is the most basic. It is nothing more than notes or record keeping. There is no financial information about units, only physical descriptions and historical records. PropMan does nothing with this information except store and retrieve it. TENANT INFORMATION Tenants may be PREVIOUS, CURRENT or NEW. A PREVIOUS tenant is one that has moved out of a unit. A CURRENT tenant has moved in and not yet moved out. A NEW tenant has not yet moved in. The records for each tenant include personal information about spouse, work, cars and such; financial information about monthly rent, due dates, deposits and so on; and a financial history of the tenant's activity. For each unit there is at least one set of tenant information. When tenant information is requested, the current tenant is recalled first. Any previous tenants' or new tenant's data are then available. ACCOUNTING ACTIVITIES PropMan is an on-line single entry accounting system. All transactions are posted as they are entered. This means that there are no posting or trial balance operations to perform. It also means that all PropMan accounting reports are always current. Up to the second Month-to-date and Year-to-date information is available at any time. Invoices are reflected in statements as soon as they are entered. You may enter invoices as you receive them and mark them paid later after you pay them. Or, you can enter them as you pay them. All unpaid invoices must be cleared each month. PropMan will not close a month until the month's business is complete. 3 - 4 When the month's business is closed PropMan forces the money available and the money used to match. At month end any cash on hand is paid to the owner. Alternatively, if there is a shortage, money will be taken from the General reserves to cover it. In either case, each month, for each building the money available always equals the money used. ARCHIVES PropMan archives data and keeps it available for review and listings. Monthly data is available for the last eleven months. Year-end data is kept indefinitely. This archiving is done as part of the normal month end and year end closes. No special action is required from the user. See Appendix B concerning archives and backups. FILE PURGES Data for buildings and tenants accumulates continuously. Outdated data should be purged occasionally to free disk space for reuse. The purges make major, irreversible changes to the data. It is a good idea to backup PropMan before running a purge. The Help for these operations contains warnings to remind you of the advisability of backing up before running a purge. 4 - 1 MENUS AND SCREENS This section contains a detailed description of each menu selection and each item on the data displays. Most of this information can also be found in the PropMan F1 Help. In the descriptions of the screens there are references to specific words or phrases that appear on that screen or on other screens. These words are in italic type. Any words or phrases in italic type actually appear on some PropMan screen, either in full or abbreviated. These could be field names, menu selections, prompts, error messages and so on. The descriptions also reference figures showing the screens. These figures are all in Appendix C. Each time a new PropMan system is started there is a New System Setup screen that is shown only until the first building is made active. After this it is never seen again. The setup screen is covered at the very end of this section, after all of the other screens. SCREEN HEADING AND MESSAGES See figure C-1. All screens have a common format. At the top of the heading is the licensee's name. On the left the current Processing Month or Archive Review Month is displayed. On the right the current date and time are displayed. This information is always present. When the Archive Review Month is shown, the month may be changed to select the desired archives. The Processing Month is only changed by the Month End Close (see the New System Setup screens at the end of this section). Most operations are performed on a single building at a time. For these operations, the Building number and Name are also shown in the heading. Whenever building specific information is displayed, the cursor can be moved to the Building number to enter or change the building to be acted on. PropMan will verify the number and then display the Name. At the bottom of each screen are two message lines. The last line is a data entry prompt. It specifies the type of input 4 - 2 allowed at the current cursor position. A prompt message is displayed at all times. During longer operations the prompt changes to a message asking you to wait or telling you that data is being written. When PropMan is again ready for input, a data entry prompt will be redisplayed. The line above the prompt message is used for error messages. When invalid data or commands are entered PropMan sounds a two tone horn and displays an error message. Error messages are removed when the next key is pressed. See section 5, Errors; and Appendix F, Error Messages. 4 - 3 MAIN MENU In normal operation the Main Menu, figure C-3, is the first screen displayed when PropMan is started. This screen shows general categories of PropMan activities. The activities are grouped roughly by frequency of use. Each selection on the Main Menu leads to a second level menu. Those menus show the activities in each group. Daily operations - These are items that might be performed on any or every day. They are the common, on-going activities such as keeping tenant records, collecting money and paying bills. See figure C-4. Month end operations - This includes monthly reporting, both on screen and printed, and the monthly close. The reports can be run at any time during the month for month-to-date totals. See figure C-13. On demand operations - These are commonly used but have no special time or frequency of use. Here are tenant rent reports and notices, accounting corrections and some others. See figure C-22. System maintenance - This menu contains activities that are needed to record background information about your properties and to manage your computerized system. See figure C-26. Reference listings - These are detail listings of data. They normally contain information that seldom or never changes. See figure C-40. Archive review - This menu controls on screen review and printing of archives. See figure C-46. In the rest of this section, these Main Menu selections are covered individually. Each second level menu is discussed and then followed by the data screens that can be called by that menu. 4 - 4 DAILY OPERATIONS MENU See figure C-4. These are the common, ongoing activities. Invoices - Invoices are bills that you have to pay. They are entered, changed, reviewed and marked as paid from this screen. Tenant activity - Tenant activity includes any information about your tenants. Three different screens are used. Tenants are moved in and out, deposits and rents collected and the like. A payment history and personal information are maintained. Miscellaneous receipts - This is for receipt of money that is not from a specific tenant. It may be money from a laundry room, interest earned on a checking account or money from the owner. Bank deposits - All receipts and NSF reversals are entered into batched bank deposits. This screen allows deposits to be reviewed and closed. 4 - 5 INVOICES See Figure C-5. This screen is used to enter and change invoices. As soon as an invoice is entered and any time it is changed, the information is immediately reflected in all accounting reports. Invoices may be changed any time until their Status is PAID. An independent file of invoices is maintained for each building. Invoices are numbered sequentially starting with 1 each month. First on the file are invoices held over from the previous month, next are any PropMan generated mortgage payments and then invoices entered by the user. The fields on the Invoice screen: Building: Name: - A building number is required for Invoice operations. Only ACTIVE buildings may have invoices. When a valid building number is entered, the name is displayed. Invoice Number: - This is "our" invoice number. It is assigned by PropMan and is unique to this invoice. There is only one invoice for this building in this month with this invoice number. To see an existing invoice, enter its number. To enter a new invoice, enter a zero for the number. PropMan will assign the next number in sequence and display it for you. Desc: - The invoice description is not used by PropMan. It is maintained and displayed for the user. Status: - An invoice is NEW while it is being entered. When entry is complete, it immediately becomes UN-PAID (see Paid Date on this screen). An invoice with a Paid Date has a status of PAID. If an invoice is not to be paid this month it can be put on HOLD status. Invoices on HOLD can be released back to UN-PAID at any time. NEW, UN-PAID and PAID invoices are all included in accounting reports. NEW and UN-PAID invoices may be changed. PAID invoices may not. Invoices on HOLD may not be altered and are not included in accounting reports. When the current month is closed, they will be copied forward to the next month's invoice file. Invoices can remain on HOLD indefinitely and will be copied forward until they are released from HOLD and paid. To place an existing invoice on HOLD, enter an 'H' as in hold. To remove an invoice from HOLD, enter a 'P' as in payable. To mark an invoice PAID, see Paid Date on this screen. Amount: - The total amount to be paid for this invoice. This will always equal the total of the Distribution Amounts on this screen. Either the total amount or the distributions may be entered or changed. PropMan will keep them in step. 4 - 6 Vendor Number : Vendor Name : - The vendor is the person or business that the invoice is from. The number is their number in PropMan's vendor file. It may be zero for cash invoices, or for vendors that are not in the vendor file. The invoice Amount is charged to the vendor's Default Account and added to the vendor's $ Volume. When the number is entered. The vendor's name is displayed. Vendor Inv Number : Inv Date : - This is the invoice number and date from the invoice. It is 'their' number and date. It is not used by PropMan. It is maintained and displayed for your information. Distribution Amount : - An invoice may be distributed to up to five accounts. When an invoice Amount is entered, above on this screen, the full amount is shown here as the first distribution. If a multiple distribution is needed, the amounts can be entered here. PropMan will keep the invoice Amount equal to the total of these distributions Distribution Acct : - These specify the accounts to which the individual Distribution Amounts are to be charged. When a Vendor Number is entered, above on this screen, the vendor's Default Account is entered as the first Distribution Account. The accounts may be changed if needed. When an account number is accepted, its name from the Chart of Accounts is displayed next to it. Due date: - This field is not used by PropMan. It is maintained and displayed as a reminder. Paid date: - Invoices with a Paid Date are PAID. The Paid Date can be entered at anytime (even for NEW invoices). Once the invoice has been saved with a Paid Date, it is marked PAID and no further changes are allowed. See Status on this screen. Hold date: - This field is maintained by PropMan. When an invoice is placed on HOLD (see Status on this screen), the current date is saved and displayed here until the invoice is released from HOLD. 4 - 7 TENANT ACTIVITY Tenant activity requires three screens to contain the data. The Tenant Financial screen is shown first. From this either the Payment History or the Tenant Personal screens may be requested by using the function keys. In addition, this data is maintained for previous tenants and tenants not yet moved in. This information is accessed by calling up the appropriate Unit and then using function keys at the Tenant Name field. TENANT FINANCIAL SCREEN The Tenant Financial screen has the most commonly used operations and data. Here rent receipts and other financial transactions are entered, rents are changed and tenants moved in and out. See figure C-6. In the ongoing operation of ACTIVE buildings, virtually all actions involving tenants are controlled from this screen. There are three categories of tenants, NEW, CURRENT and PREVIOUS, (see Status on this screen). For each tenant status, slightly different data may be entered and the cursor only moves to the allowable fields or actions. As data is entered or changed, accounts are kept up to date and future actions scheduled. When a building is NEW (see New Building Start Up), Tenant Financial only allows entry of historical or background data about tenants. In NEW buildings all tenants show a Status of NEW. No accounting activities (see Activity fields on this screen) are allowed for these NEW buildings. Information such as original move in date, deposits being held etc. should be entered. This information is used as the starting point for the building when the building status is changed to ACTIVE (see Status on the Building Changes General screen). The fields on the Tenant Financial screen: Building: Name : - All Tenant Activities require a building number. It may be a NEW, ACTIVE or DELETED building. The allowable actions vary for NEW or ACTIVE buildings. In DELETED buildings data may be reviewed only. When the Building number is accepted, the Name is displayed. Unit: - All tenant information is called up by Unit ID. The Unit ID must match one of the IDs specified when the building was first started in the PropMan system. There are Next/Prev function keys to step through the Unit IDs. Post full rent paid (Y/N)? - This question is shown only for CURRENT tenants who have not paid any rent so far this month. A "N"o answer removes the question. A "Y"es answer removes the question but first enters a financial activity (see Activity ... fields on this screen), showing the full Scheduled Rent paid on the current date. 4 - 8 Tenant: - Enter or change the name of the tenant. Changing the name does not change the tenant. A tenant name changed here is changed to correct spelling or some such. All of the other data stays the same. There is just a new name for the same person. See Status, Date In and Date Out on this screen. On this field function keys are used to call up information about other tenants who have occupied the unit (PREVIOUS tenants), and tenants who have not yet moved into the unit (NEW tenants). When tenant data for the unit is first is displayed, the tenant name and all other data are for the CURRENT or most recent tenant in the unit. When the cursor is on this field, There are function keys labeled Next and Previous Tenant Name (press F1 to see the function keys). Prev Tenant Name calls up data about the previous tenant in the unit. The Prev Tenant Name function will step back one tenant at a time through any previous tenants. The Next Tenant Name function steps forward one tenant at a time. Stepping as far forward as possible calls up a NEW tenant. This is data about a tenant who has not yet moved in. See also Date In and Status on this screen. Status: - This field is maintained by PropMan according to the Date In and Date Out fields entered by the user. There are three statuses. A NEW tenant has not yet moved into a unit. For each unit there may be only one NEW tenant. The CURRENT tenant is the occupant of the unit. For each unit there may be one CURRENT tenant. When a CURRENT tenant moves out they become a PREVIOUS tenant. The data on PREVIOUS tenants accumulates indefinitely until Purge Files is performed. Activity Date : - Not used by PropMan. PropMan maintains and displays it for the user. It defaults to the current date. Activities, independent of their date, are always accepted as business for the current Processing Month. See NOTE below after Activity Type in this section. Activity Amount : - Enter the money involved. The accounts in PropMan for this building will be affected by this amount. See NOTE below after Activity Type in this section. Activity Type : - There are only a few reasons a tenant might have a financial activity; rent paid, deposit paid, deposit refunded; and so on. PropMan contains a list of these activities. When the cursor is on this field use the function keys for Next and Previous Activity Type (press F1 to see the function keys) to step through the list of financial activities to find the one that applies. They are listed with the more common first and the seldom used last. The activities are: Rent Paymnt - Money was received for rent; cash, check, money order are all entered the same. This is account 2510. Other Pymnt - Money was received for Other Due; cash, check, money order are all entered the same. This is account 2550. "deposit" Pymnt(s) - Money was received to be held in a deposit account; cash, check, money order are all entered the same. These are accounts 2610 through 2650. "deposit" will display as the actual names of your deposit accounts. 4 - 9 "deposit" Refnd(s) - Money will be taken from the indicated deposit account These are accounts 1910 through 1950. "deposit" will display as the actual names of your deposit accounts. Other Assmt - The tenant has been charged for damage or a fee. The money will be added to Other Due. Rent NSF - A check accepted for Rent Paymnt has been returned, uncashed. It is backed out of account 2510. Other NSF - A check accepted for Other Pymnt has been returned, uncashed. It is backed out of account 2550. "deposit" NSF(s) - A check accepted for a "deposit" Pymnt has been returned, uncashed. It is backed out of the appropriate 2610-2650 account. "deposit" will display as the actual names of your deposit accounts. Rpeal Assmt - No money has been received. The tenant was assessed a charge using Other Assmt. The charge is now being removed from Other Due without payment. Rent Credit - No money has been received. The tenant is being given credit toward the Rent Due as if rent had been paid. This is shown as income in account 2530 and as an expense in account 1720. Rent Refund - The tenant has a credit balance for Rent Due. Money will be taken from the credit balance. It is backed out of account 2510. Other Refund - The tenant has a credit balance for Other Due. Money will be taken from the credit balance. It is backed out of account 2550. Apt Allow - No money has been received. The tenant is given an apartment allowance as credit toward the Rent Due as if rent had been paid. This is shown as income in account 2520 and as an expense in account 1110. L-M-R Used - No money has been received. The deposit for the last months rent is to be used. Money is taken from the tenant's L-M-R deposit balance and credited toward Rent Due. This is shown as a deposits refunded expense in account 1950 and as income in account 2540. NOTE. Activities that involve money received or NSF checks returned are entered in the current Bank Deposit. These activities may be changed only as long as that deposit remains open. Once the Bank Deposit has been closed, activities up to that point are fixed. Reversing entries may be made but no changes to the original entries are allowed. An example: a check for rent is in one deposit and the deposit is closed; the NSF entry for the check can be in another deposit but the entry made when the check was received cannot be accessed. Sched rent: - The Scheduled Rent is the normal monthly rent. On the Due Day each month the Rent Due is increased by this amount, Move In/Out prorates excepted. See also Paid to on this screen. 4 - 10 Due day: - This is the day of the month when the Sched Rent is due. It may be entered only for NEW tenants. After a tenant moves in the Due Day cannot be changed. Paid to: - This is the last day for which rent is paid in full. When a tenant first moves in the Paid To date is one month after the Date In. In the second month the rent is prorated to adjust the Paid To date to the day before the rent Due Day. The Paid To date will fall on the day before a Due Day from then on, until a move out prorate is performed. In the month when a tenant moves out, the rent is prorated so that the Paid to date matches the Date Out. NOTE. When entering data about tenants already living in a NEW building just being entered into PropMan, enter the tenant's paid date at the start of the Processing Month in which you are starting the building. Rent due: - This is the total amount needed to pay in full all rents due up through the current date. Partial payments lower the Rent Due but do not advance the Paid To date. When a full months rent is accumulated the Paid To date is advanced. Overpayments show as a credit balance for Rent Due until a full months overpayment is accumulated. The Paid To date is then advanced and one months rent deducted from the credit balance. Other Due: - This is a running total of Other Assessments charged less Other Payments made. It is money owed by the tenant, but the charges and payments are not part of the rent. This is typically damage charges, late fees of bad check charges. Last Rent: Last Date: - These two fields are a record of the last time the rent was changed for this tenant. The Last Rent was the monthly rent that this tenant paid before it was changed to the current Scheduled Rent. The Last Date is the date the change took place and the current Scheduled Rent went to effect. New Rent: New Date: - These two fields show when the next change in rent is scheduled. The New Rent is the amount the rent will be changed to when it next changes. The New Date is the date when the change will take place. On the New Date, the Scheduled Rent will be changed to the amount of the New Rent. The date must always fall on a rent Due day for this tenant. On that date and from then on the new Scheduled Rent will be due each month. The Last Rent and Date on this screen will be set to record this change. The New Rent and Date will be set to blank. Date in: - When a building is in normal operation, PropMan uses this date to schedule automatic move in of tenants. When entering data about a NEW tenant for the unit, enter the date that the tenant will move in. On that date, this NEW tenant will be moved in and marked as CURRENT. If there is a tenant in the unit, that tenant will be given a Date out and marked as PREVIOUS. The Date in may be entered before or after the actual move in, but PropMan will not accept move in dates for Processing Months that have been closed. NOTE. When entering information about tenants already living in a NEW building being started in PropMan for the first time, enter the date that the tenant originally moved in. PropMan will merely record the date. 4 - 11 Lease exp: - The Lease Expiration date is used to print a tickler file of leases. See the Lease Expiration in the Unit/Tenant reference listings. Pay / Quit: - The date of the most recent 3 day notice for this tenant. If a 3 day notice is prepared by hand, you may enter the date here. When PropMan writes a 3 day notice, it enters the date here. See 3-Day Notices on the Letters / Notices screen. Date out: - PropMan uses this date to schedule automatic move out of tenants. Enter the date that the tenant will move out. On that date the CURRENT tenant will be moved out and marked PREVIOUS. The unit will be vacant until a NEW tenant moves in. The date may be entered before or after the actual move out, but PropMan will not accept dates for Processing Months that have been closed. Close: - Should this tenant's accounts be closed? Closing a tenant's accounts means that there will be no more financial transactions with the tenant. You have collected all of the payments that you are going to get; and you have paid all of the refunds that you are going to pay. To close, answer 'Y"es. After the tenant has moved out, At next PropMan Month End Close, PropMan will change this to say Closed. The retained deposits will be deducted from the deposit balances for the building. Unpaid rent will no longer be shown as overdue. Deposit Balances - The 5 deposit account names from the Chart of Accounts are shown here along with the amounts being held for this tenant. Normally these are maintained by PropMan according to deposit activities. NOTE. When entering information about tenants already living in a NEW building being started in PropMan for the first time, enter the amounts of the deposits already being held. TENANT PAYMENT HISTORY The second tenant screen is a history of the tenant's financial activities. There is no data entry on this screen. See figure C-7. The fields on the Tenant Payment History: Building: Name: - See the Tenant Financial screen, above. Unit: - See Tenant Financial screen, above. Tenant: - No data entry. The function keys for Next/Prev Tenant Name may be used to see other tenants who have used this unit. The name may be entered on the Tenant Financial or Tenant Personal screens. The history data on the lower portion of the screen has the last 26 Activities entered for this tenant. These do not include the current Processing Month. When Month End Close is run all of the Activities for the month being closed are moved from the Tenant Financial screen, above, to this Payment 4 - 12 History screen. Older data is removed from the top of the left column. The new activities are added at the bottom of the right column. TENANT PERSONAL SCREEN The third screen contains personal information. PropMan does little with this except maintain and display it for the user. See figure C-8. Building: Name: - See Tenant Financial screen. Unit: - See Tenant Financial screen. Tenant: - See Tenant Financial screen. Status: - See Tenant Financial screen. Other Occupants - Other occupants of the unit in addition to the tenant may be listed here. These names can be used on the 3-Day-Notices printed in the Letters / Notices operations. Phone: - Enter one or two if desired. These are used in the telephone lists printed by PropMan. See the Telephone List on the General reference listings screen and the Tenant Phone List on the Unit / Tenant reference listings screen. Garage: Locker: Car: - These are not used by PropMan. They are maintained and displayed for the user. Tenant's Employer Spouse's Employer - These items are not used by PropMan. They are maintained and displayed for the user. Pages 4 - 13, 4 - 14 and 4 - 15 intentionally omitted. 4 - 16 MISCELLANEOUS RECEIPTS See figure C-9. This screen is used to enter the receipt of money that is not credited to a particular tenant, but is income generated by the building or other cash available for the building. Examples are: income from a laundry room, interest on an bank account or cash from the owner. As each receipt is entered or changed the amount appears in all other accounting reports. Miscellaneous receipts are included in the current Bank Deposit. As long as the deposit remains open, the receipt may be changed. After the deposit is closed, no more changes may be made to the receipt. It may still be reviewed on this screen. The fields for Miscellaneous Receipts: Building: Name: - Miscellaneous Receipts require a building number. It may be an ACTIVE or DELETED building. Only ACTIVE buildings may have Miscellaneous Receipts entered. For DELETED buildings data may be reviewed only. When the building number is accepted, the name is displayed. Receipt Number: - The receipts are numbered sequentially, starting with one each month. Enter a zero and PropMan will display the number of the next receipt in sequence. Enter the number of an existing receipt to review or change it. Acct - This is the account the money is accepted into. Only accounts 2560-2590 Income (non-unit) and 2810-2850 Cash From Owners are allowed. When a valid account number is accepted, the name is displayed. Amount - The dollar amount that was received. It may not be negative. Account Corrections must be used to make reversing entries. Description - Not used by PropMan. This field is maintained and displayed for the user. 4 - 17 BANK DEPOSITS SCREEN All receipts entered on the Tenant Financial screen or the Miscellaneous Receipts screen are included in the current bank deposit. This screen allows the deposits to be reviewed on screen or printed. It also allows a Current Bank Deposit to be closed and a new one opened. See figure C-10. A single deposit may contain receipts from one or several buildings. Only one building at a time may be reviewed on screen. However printed reports contain data for all buildings in a deposit. The fields on the Bank Deposits screen: Building: Name: - Bank Deposits require a building number. It may be an ACTIVE or DELETED building. When the building number is accepted, the name is displayed. Display Bank Deposit: - Any deposit for the current month may be examined. The deposit number entered here will also be shown in the Print Deposit operation on this screen. Current Bank Deposit: - PropMan displays the number of the deposit that is now being accumulated. This is the deposit that activities on the Tenant Financial and Miscellaneous Receipts screens are currently being accepted into. The body of the screen contains the account names and the amounts that have been accepted for each account. These are grouped in the three summary accounts for which money can be accepted. The totals At the lower left of the screen are the totals for each of the three summary accounts and a total of all receipts for this building in this deposit. Print Deposit "n": - The "n" will be the same deposit number as entered for Display Deposit Number on this screen. The printed data is the same as the screen display. When deposit data is printed, data is printed for all buildings that had activity in that deposit, even if it has not been reviewed on screen. Print All Deposits: - The same data as the screen display is printed. Data for all deposits this month including the current deposit are printed. Totals are shown for each building, deposit and for the month. Close Current Deposit: - After verifying that a deposit is correct, it can be closed. After the deposit is closed no more changes may be made to the receipts entered for that deposit. The next deposit number in sequence becomes the Current Bank Deposit, above. 4 - 17 MONTH END OPERATIONS MENU This menu allows selection of month end reports and the monthly close. The reports can be run during the month to see month to date data if desired. See figure C-13. Income / Expense recap - There are three screens to show the up to the minute financial status of the building. Print Month end statements - These reports show the financial and tenant activity for the month. Month end close - After all activity for the month has been entered, the close is run. 4 - 19 INCOME / EXPENSE RECAP See figure C-14. The three recap screens display the current status of any building and allow entry of reserve account activity. There are month-to-date and year-to-date activity summaries and a display of the current balances in the various balance accounts. When the recap is selected the Income / Expense Month-to-Date screen is displayed from there you may use the function keys to call up the Income / Expense Year-to-Date or the Account Balances screens. INCOME / EXPENSE MONTH-TO-DATE INCOME / EXPENSE YEAR-TO-DATE These two screens have the same format. Only the heading and totals are different. They include all data entered since either the start of the year or start of the month up to the last invoices, receipts, corrections and etc. There is no data entry on either of these screens. The data on the Income / Expense screens: Building: Name: - The recaps require a building number. It may be a NEW or ACTIVE building. NEW buildings will have no activity but will show balances on the Account Balances screen. When the building number is accepted, the Name is displayed. INCOME - Listed under this heading is all activity for the 2500 (Income) detail accounts. Following this is the total of the 2600 (Deposits Collected) accounts. Then the total of all monies collected is shown. DISBURSEMENTS - Listed under this heading are summaries of the disbursements. Operating Expenses is the total of summary accounts 1200-1700 (Utilities, Fixed Expenses, Maintenance Repairs, Decorating, Taxes / Insurance, Management / Sundry Expenses). Replacements is the total for summary account 1800. Deposits Refunded is the total for summary account 1900. Mortgages is the total of summary accounts 2000-2200 (Mortgage Principal, Interest, Impounds). Then the total of all disbursements is shown. Operating Income(Loss) - This figure is the net of the income less the disbursements. It is the profit or loss so far this month or year from operating this building. From(To) Reserves - This is net of the activity in the reserve accounts, 2300 To Reserves and 2700 From Reserves. Large amounts may be retained in and later spent from reserves over a period of time. This figure shows whether, overall, reserves are being built up or consumed. From(To) Owners - This is the net cash paid to or supplied by owners, accounts 2400 To Owners and 2800 From Owners. Owners may take a large income one time, and then put money in to make up a shortage later. Here is, perhaps, the most important number in the PropMan system. How much has the building earned for the owner. 4 - 20 Cash on hand (shortage) - This is the net of the three figures above. A positive figure means there is cash on hand. A negative figure means there is a cash shortage. Shortages may be covered by spending reserves (see Reserves Spent on the Account Balances screen) or by a cash input from the owner (see the Miscellaneous Receipts screen). If there is cash on hand or a cash shortage at the end of the month, the Month End Close will clear it. Cash available is considered paid to the owner. It will be entered in account 2410 Cash To Owner. A shortage will be entered in account 2710 From General Reserves. The General Reserve balance will be adjusted accordingly. ACCOUNT BALANCES The third recap screen is Account Balances. See figure C-15. It too includes all activity to date. On this screen are the current balances of all balance accounts in the system; reserves, deposits and mortgages. Data entered on this screen specifies the movement of money in and out of reserves via the 1910-1950 To Reserves, and 2710 - 2750 From Reserves, activity accounts. RESERVES Acct - These are the names of the five reserve accounts from the Chart of Accounts. RESERVES Balance - This is current balance in each reserve account, including this month's activities. Reserve account balances cannot normally be negative. The exception to this is the General reserve. If PropMan needs to cover a cash shortage when closing out a month, it will take the money from General reserves even if the reserves are made negative. RESERVES Retained - These amounts are this months activity in the 2310-2350 To Reserves accounts. This amount has been taken from Cash on hand and added to the reserve balances. At the beginning of each month's business they are set to the default amounts specified by Monthly Reserves on the building General information screen. They may then be changed here if desired. See NOTE after RESERVES Spent. RESERVES Spent - These amounts are this months activity in the 2710-2750 From Reserves accounts. This the amount that has been taken from the reserve balances and added to Cash on hand. At then end of each month, during the close, they are set back to zero. The new months Reserves Spent can then be entered here. See the NOTE below. NOTE. In a single month each reserve may have a Retained amount or a Spent amount but not both. If either one is entered, the other is set to zero for that reserve. DEPOSITS Acct - These are the names of the five deposit accounts from the Chart of Accounts. 4 - 21 DEPOSITS Balance - These are the current balances in each deposit account, including this month's activities. DEPOSITS Collected - These are the totals for the 2610-2650 Deposits Collected accounts this month. DEPOSITS Paid - These are the totals for the 1910-1950 Deposit Refunded accounts this month. MORTGAGES Acct - These are the names of the nine accounts 2010-2190 Mortgage Principal / Fees from the Chart of Accounts. The first five accounts are fixed by PropMan and are always T.D. accounts. They are displayed here slightly differently than the last four. MORTGAGES Payments - Mortgage payments are normally distributed to three accounts, principal, interest and impound (or escrow). Although the impound amount is often zero. The amount shown for Payment for the five T.D. accounts, is the total of these three distributions for that mortgage. The amount shown for 1st T.D. is the total of 2010 (1st T.D. Principal/ Fees) plus 2110 (1st T.D. Interest) plus 2210 (1st T.D. Impounds). The 2nd T.D. is the total of 2020, 2120 and 2220, and so on for the five T.D.s. For the other four accounts, the Payment is the amount from accounts 2060-2090 only. These accounts may be set up by the user. There are no corresponding accounts 2160-2190 or 2260-2290. MORTGAGES Balance - These are the current mortgage principal balances, including this months payments. There are only five mortgage balance accounts. They correspond to five T.D. accounts. CASH On-hand (Shortage) - This shows the same amount and is the same as Cash on hand (shortage) on the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date screens. If Reserves Spent or Reserves Retained are changed, Cash on-hand is kept in step. 4 - 22 MONTH END STATEMENTS These are statements that are associated with month-end reporting. They are always available. Because PropMan keeps all of its data current all of the time, these reports can be run anytime to see month-to-date or year-to-date values. See figure C-16. The fields on the Month End Statements screen: Buildings Num Name - Statements can be written for "ALL" buildings or for up to five specific buildings. When a building number is entered the name is displayed. Print Month-to-Date - Recap - The recap contains a summary of the activity so far his month and shows the current account balances. It has similar data to the Month-to-Date and Account Balances screens but in a different format. Print Month-to-Date - Income / Expense Detail - This lists the month's accounting activity in four reports. The Income by Unit shows money collected, including previous and current balances owed for each tenant. The Miscellaneous Receipts Report is a listing of receipts entered on the Miscellaneous Receipts screen. The Invoice List shows the invoices for the building. The fourth report is the Account Corrections; a listing of the entries on the Account Corrections screen. Print Month-to-Date - Account Activity - The Account Activity report lists the accounts in the Chart of Accounts and their activity. Subtotals, summaries and account balances are included. Print Month-to-Date - All Above - This prints one set of all of the month to date reports above for the buildings specified. Print Year-to-Date - Recap - This is the same report as the Month-to-Date Recap, but the data includes all activity so far this year. Print Year-to-Date - Account Activity - This is the same report as the Month-to-Date Account Activity, but the data includes all activity so far this year. Print Year-to-Date - Percentage Analysis - This report shows both month-to-date and year-to-date activity. All income and expenses are shown as a percentage of the gross Scheduled rent. 4 - 23 MONTH END CLOSE The Month End Close displays a series of screens and generates a printed report. The screens inform the user of the progress of the close. If the close is successful, the report is a record of the close. If the close fails, the report contains a list of the open items that must be resolved before the close can be completed. When Month End Close is selected, the first screen is a warning reminding the user that they are closing out all business for the current Processing Month. See figure C-17. There is only one field: Close Accounts - A 'N'o answer returns to the Month End Operations menu with no harm done. A 'Y'es answer starts the close process. After the 'Y'es, no further action is required from the user, except as noted below for December. Either the close will be completed or a list of open items will be printed. If the close is for December, a second warning is added to the same screen. This reminds the user that the December close automatically performs the year end close. See figure C-18. Again, there is only one field: Close Accounts - A 'N'o answer returns to the Month End Operations menu with no harm done. A 'Y'es answer starts the close process. After the 'Y'es, no further action is required from the user. Either the close will be completed or a list of open items will be printed. INVOICE / REFUND REVIEW The close processing starts with an examination of the month's transactions. Invoices may not be left UN-PAID. They must be either PAID or on HOLD. See Status on the Invoice screen. Every building is checked for unpaid invoices. If any are found, they are listed and the close will not take place. All buildings are examined even if open items are found. While the data is being examined, the progress is displayed on the screen. See figure C-19. Building - The number and name of the building being examined is displayed. 4 - 24 Paid Invoices Un-Paid invoices Held invoices - As the invoices and refunds are examined, running totals of the items in each category are displayed. If there are unpaid invoices or refunds, the detail of those is printed. After the data is examined the final counts for the building are printed. This screen is repeated and the open items and final counts for each building are printed. If any open items were detected for any building, the close stops after the examination. See End of Close Messages, below. CLOSING OUT ACCOUNTS If there are no open items, the close proceeds. Each building is closed individually. While a building is being closed the number and name are displayed on the screen. See figure C-20. The operations performed during the close are: 1 Any cash on hand or cash shortage is adjusted to zero. No money is carried from month to month except in reserve accounts. All money available for the building is used in some manner. If there is cash on hand at the close it is paid to the owner and entered in account 2410 Cash to Owner, there is shortage not made up by the owner it is taken from account 2710 General Reserve. 2 The monthly accounting data is rolled into the Year-to-Date totals. 3 The Account Activity, Invoices, Miscellaneous Receipts and Account Corrections for the month being closed are archived. The oldest archives of these data, now 12 months old, is discarded. 4 The tenant activities from the month being closed are moved to the tenant Payment History. 5 The Bank Deposit data is discarded. The deposit number is set back to one. 6 For the new month, the 1900 To Reserves accounts are set to the monthly default values specified on the building General information screens. All other activity accounts are set to zero. 7 Any invoices on HOLD are copied to the new months invoice file. 8 Mortgage payment invoices for building mortgages are put in the new months invoice file according to the mortgage information in the building file. All of the above take place each month. In December a Year-End-Close follows the Month-End-Close automatically. The following also occurs at year end: 1 The Year-to-Date account activity data is moved to a permanent Year-End Archive. 2 The Year-to-Date data is set to zero for the new year. 3 The year to date dollar volume total for each vendor is set to zero. 4 - 25 END OF CLOSE MESSAGES However the close terminates a message is displayed on the screen and printed at the end of the report. The message either reports a successful close or states why the close was stopped. See figure C-21. The simplest message is the successful close message. It states the success and gives the new current Processing Month. PropMan is now operating in the new month. The user may begin entering the new months business anytime. The close stopped messages appear in various combinations to tell the user why the close was stopped. Figure C-21 shows all of the normal messages. Only the pertinent ones print. If the close is not successful, operation of PropMan may continue as if no close had been attempted. The processing month has not changed. No data has been changed. All PropMan operations are still available. 4 - 26 ON DEMAND OPERATIONS MENU Notices / letters - From here three day notices and change of terms notices are requested. Account corrections - Be very careful with this. You may change almost any financial data in the system with corrections. It is used to fix bad data that may have gotten to the system. 4 - 27 LETTERS / NOTICES SCREEN See figure C-23. PropMan can select various groups from its data and send personalized letters to them. The user can write or edit the letters and then select who is to receive them. To PropMan letters and notices mean the same thing. 3-Day Notice is the name of one of the letters. The letters and notices use a free form technique. The user writes the fixed part of the letter, a "skeleton", and indicates to PropMan where to insert names, addresses and amounts. PropMan prints a complete letter for each recipient. See Appendix D, Free Form Letters and Notices. The fields on the Letters / Notices screen: Buildings Num Name: - Letters can be written for 'ALL' buildings or for up to 5 specific buildings. Only ACTIVE buildings are allowed. When a building number is accepted its name is displayed. Unit ID - Tenant Letters may be printed for 'ALL' tenants or for one tenant in a particular building. If only one building number is entered under Buildings Num, above, then a Unit ID may be entered here. If more than one building number or 'ALL' is entered, then the Unit ID is set to 'ALL' and may not be changed. If an ID is entered the current tenant is displayed. Print Over-due-rent List: - The buildings specified will be scanned. A report is printed showing all tenants with rent that became due on or before the current date, and that has not been paid in full. If 3-Day Notices, below, are printed, a notice will be printed for each person on this list. Print 3-Day Notices: - A letter is written to each tenant in the selected buildings with over due rent. The Over-due-rent List, above, is a review list for these notices. The skeleton for this letter is the file 3DAY.LTR. PropMan is delivered with a general form of a 3 day notice in this file. Before you serve one of these notices, be sure that it meets the legal requirements of your city, county or state. Some local ordinances require very specific wording. Print Rent-changes List: - The selected buildings will be examined. Tenants with a scheduled rent change in the next 2 months will be listed in a printed report. Print Rent-change Notices: - A letter is written to each tenant in the selected buildings with a rent change in the next 2 months. The Rent-changes List, above, is a review list for these notices. The skeleton for this letter is in the file RENTCHNG.LTR. PropMan is delivered with a general form of a rent change notice in this file. Before you use one of these notices, be sure that it meets the legal requirements of your city, county or state. Some local ordinances require very specific wording. Pages 4 - 28 and 4 - 29 intentionally omitted. 4 - 30 ACCOUNT CORRECTIONS SCREEN See figure C-25. Account Corrections should be rarely needed. Use it carefully. Virtually any account balance or account activity in the system can be changed here. When your record of a loan balance and the bank's are out of step, it can be fixed here. When you stop payment on a check, the money can be reentered into the system here. The Account Corrections fields: Building: Num Name: - The number of an ACTIVE building is required. When a number is accepted, the name is displayed. Correction Number: - The corrections are numbered sequentially, starting with one each month. Enter a zero and PropMan will display the number of the next correction in sequence. Enter the number of an existing correction to review or change it. Acct - The account number that the correction is to be applied to. All account numbers in the system are valid. When a valid number is entered its name from the Chart of Accounts is displayed. Activity Correction - If the correction is to affect activity in the account for this month's business, enter the amount of the correction here. Example, a Miscellaneous Receipt was entered this month into the wrong account and the Bank Deposit has been closed. A reversing correction can be made to remove the activity from the incorrect account. A second correction can then put the activity into the correct account. Any account may have an activity correction. Balance Correction - If the correction is not to show up as activity but is to affect one of the balance accounts directly, enter a Balance Correction. Example, the bank shows a different mortgage balance than PropMan. The correction can be made directly to the mortgage balance without affecting the mortgage activity accounts for the month. Balance corrections may only be made to accounts with running balances; mortgages, deposits and reserves. Description - This is not used by PropMan. It is maintained and displayed for the user. 4 - 31 SYSTEM MAINTENANCE MENU See figure C-26. System Maintenance consists of operations that are needed to allow the computer system to operate properly. This is where the housekeeping for PropMan is done. These operations are used extensively when a system is first started and then rarely afterward. Vendor list - This is the list of all non-employees who provide services or supplies for any building. Chart of accounts - The account numbers are fixed but the names of the accounts are almost all changeable from this screen. Unit changes - Unit information concerns the physical unit or rental. Maintenance records and the like are kept here. Building Changes - Information on buildings that already exist in the PropMan system is updated here. New Building Start Up - This operation is used to enter information when a building is entered into the PropMan system for the first time. System Parameters - It is here that seldom changed data about PropMan and the computer hardware is maintained. Purge files - When data becomes outdated it may be purged from the PropMan system. Purged data is removed permanently. 4 - 32 VENDOR LIST SCREEN This screen is used to enter and maintain data about vendors. See figure C-27. A vendor is anyone who is paid money. PropMan will charge invoices to a pre-specified account, generate automatic mortgage payment invoices and keep track of the yearly dollar volume, only for persons and businesses that appear in the Vendor List. The Vendor List data fields are: Vendor Number: - The vendors are numbered sequentially starting with one. To review or change data about a vendor enter the Vendor Number. PropMan will display the current data. To put a new vendor into the system, enter a zero and PropMan will display the next available Vendor Number. The data for the new vendor can then be entered. Name: - This is the name that will be used for reports, invoices, mailing address etc. Status: - While a vendor's data is being entered for the first time the vendor has a status of NEW. As soon as the data is saved, the status is changed to ACTIVE. An ACTIVE vendor is one that is being used. Invoices may be charged to, and vendor checks can be cut for, ACTIVE vendors only. If a vendor is no longer being used, the status can be changed to DELETED. The data for DELETED vendors is kept for year end reporting. No more charges or checks are allowed. PropMan never reuses Vendor Numbers on its own. DELETED vendors remain in the Vendor List indefinitely and may be made ACTIVE again if desired. To reuse the number of a DELETED vendor, call up the vendor data, change the status back to ACTIVE, then enter all of the data about the new vendor. This may be done anytime, however, the yearly $ Volume for the vendor is only reset by a year-end close. Phone: - One or two phone numbers may be entered. PropMan will use these on appropriate phone lists. Service: Contact: Reference: - These fields are not used by PropMan. They are maintained and displayed for the user. $ Volume: - This is the total amount of all invoices entered for this vendor, year-to-date. Address: - The mailing address for the vendor. Default account: - This is the account that is normally charged for this vendor's invoices. When an invoice from this vendor is entered, it is charged to this account unless otherwise specified. Notes - This data is not used by PropMan. It is maintained and displayed for the user. Deleted: - If a vendor is DELETED, the date is noted here. The date is removed if the vendor is later made ACTIVE again. See Status. 4 - 33 CHART OF ACCOUNTS SCREENS There are two screens for the Chart of Accounts. One shows the Summary Account names and allows selection of a Summary Account for detail display. The second shows the Detail Accounts in that Summary Account and allows the Detail Account names to be changed. SUMMARY ACCOUNTS SCREEN See figure C-28. The Summary Accounts are numbered in even hundreds from 1200-2400 for expense accounts and 2500-2800 for income accounts. None of the summary names may be changed. The data on the Summary Accounts screen: The list of accounts. - The summary accounts are listed in numerical sequence in two columns showing the account number and name. Display Detail Accounts for Summary Account: - Enter the number of a Summary Account. The Detail Accounts screen will be displayed showing all of the detail accounts in this summary. DETAIL ACCOUNTS SCREEN The Detail Accounts screen allows review of the detail account names and, where changes are permitted, allows account name changes. See figure C-29. The Detail Accounts display: Summary account. - The number and name of the summary account for these detail accounts is shown. Detail accounts. - There are normally nine detail accounts in each summary. In a few special accounts there are only one or five. This number is determined by the way PropMan uses the accounts and cannot be changed. The display shows the numbers for all accounts, and the name if the account been named. The chart of accounts delivered with PropMan has names for many of the accounts. Most of the detail account names may be changed by the user to suit their needs. All of the account names are displayed. The names that may not be changed cannot be accessed. 4 - 34 A review of the accounts: 1210-1290 Utilities, all changeable. 1310-1390 Fixed Expenses, all changeable. 1410-1490 Maintenance/ Repairs, all changeable. 1510-1590 Decorating, all changeable. 1610-1690 Taxes/ Insurance, all changeable. 1710-1790 Mgmnt/ Sundry 1710 Management Fees, fixed 1720 Rent Credit Given, fixed 1730-1790 changeable. 1810-1890 Replacements, all changeable. 1910-1950 Deposits Refunded 1910-1940 changeable (see NOTE, below) 1950 L-M-R (Last Month's Rent), fixed. 2010-2090 Mortgage Principle/ Fees 2010-2050 1st-5th Mortgage Principle, fixed 2060-2090 changeable. 2110-2150 Mortgage Interest, all fixed. 2210-2250 Mortgage Impounds, all fixed. 2310-2350 To Reserves 2310 General, fixed 2320-2350 changeable (see NOTE, below) 2410 Cash To Owner, fixed. 2510-2590 Income 2510 Rents, fixed 2520 Apt. Allowance, fixed 2530 Rent Credit, fixed 2540 L-M-R Used, fixed 2550 Other, fixed 2560-2590 changeable. 2610-2650 Deposits Collected 2610-2640 changeable (see NOTE, below) 2650 L-M-R (Last Month's Rent), fixed. 2710-2750 From Reserves 2710 General, fixed 2720-2750 changeable (see NOTE, below). 2810 Cash From Owner, fixed. NOTE. Accts 1910 - 1950 Dep Refunded and 2610 - 2650 Dep Collected always have matching names. If the name of a refund or collection account is changed, the matching account is also changed. Names for 1910 and 2610 will always match, 1920 and 2620 and so on. The same is true of 2310 - 2350 and 2710 - 2750. 4 - 35 UNIT CHANGES SCREEN This screen has records about the individual units' maintenance. See figure C-30. It is independent of tenant activities. Tenants move in and out of units. The units remain with their maintenance records. The Unit Changes screen information: Building: Name: - The unit information requires a building number. It may be a NEW, ACTIVE or DELETED. In DELETED buildings data may be reviewed only. When the building number is accepted, the Name is displayed. Unit: - A specific Unit ID can be entered or the Next/Prev Unit function keys can be used to step through the units. Tenant: Scd Rent: - The name and scheduled rent of the current tenant in the unit are displayed whenever a valid ID is entered for Unit, above. They may not be changed from this screen. See Tenant Financial screen. Carpet: Disposal: Dishwshr: Drapes: Heater: Paint: Refrig: Roof: Stove: Wtr htr: - None of these fields is used by PropMan. They are maintained and displayed for the user. Notes: - This field is not used by PropMan. It is maintained and displayed for the user. Address: - This is the mailing address for the unit. It will be used for any Letters / Notices to the tenant occupying the unit. When a building is first started in the system, PropMan assigns an addresses to each unit. It adds the Unit ID to the Address from the building General information screen. If any of the units have different addresses, they may changed here. 4 - 36 BUILDING CHANGES SCREENS The Building Changes and New Building Start Up operations both use the same set of screen formats. The same data, building background information, is handled by both. Building Changes allows changes to buildings that have already been started up. New Building Start Up is for the initial entry of building data into the system. New Building Start Up screens follow Building Changes in this manual. The screens group the data according to general, owner, mortgagee and unit information. The Next/Prev Screen Type function keys step through the screens. GENERAL CHANGES SCREEN Background information about the building is maintained here. See figure C-31. The fields on the General information screen: Building: Name: - The building number is required. It may be a NEW, ACTIVE or DELETED building. When the building number is accepted, the Name is displayed. Building status: - There are three statuses, NEW, ACTIVE and DELETED. The status determines what fields are accessible on the changes screens. More important, it determines what operations can be performed on the building throughout the PropMan system. NEW buildings are still in the start up process. PropMan is holding the data but the building is not being operated. No rents come due. No invoices can be entered or paid. No operational activities are allowed at all. While a building is NEW, its initial conditions can be entered. Mortgage, reserve and deposit balances are entered. The status of existing tenants is entered. Monetary activity cannot be entered while a building is NEW, only balances already held or owed in balance accounts. ACTIVE is the status of operating buildings. Rents come due each month; invoices can be entered and paid; all of the PropMan operations can be performed on the building. The monthly accounting and reports are available. Once a building is ACTIVE, changes to its financial data must be done with accounting transactions. The transactions will generate an audit trail. An ACTIVE building is one that is being run and PropMan is tracking what happens. DELETED is for a building that is no longer operating. Perhaps it has been sold or is being rebuilt or converted. For whatever reason no more accounting is being done for the building operations. The data for the building is retained but no activity is allowed. Reports about building or tenant background can be printed. Archives are available. DELETED buildings can be set back to ACTIVE. All buildings are closed at month end, no matter what status. NEW buildings are unaffected. A building may be held in NEW status as long as desired. ACTIVE buildings have all the close actions performed (see Month-End Close). DELETED buildings have monthly archives written that show no activity. 4 - 37 Number of Units: - PropMan counts units on the Unit ID screen and displays the count. All buildings start with one unit. Address: - This is the mailing address for the building. When a building is started this address is copied to each unit's address (see Unit Changes screen). Reserve Accounts - The five reserve accounts from the Chart of Accounts are listed here. Monthly - This is the normal or default amount to add to each reserve account each month. At the start of each month, accounts 2310 - 2350 To Reserves are set to these amounts. The amounts then may be adjusted during the month on the Account Balances screen (see Income/Expense Recap), if necessary. Balance - This is the reserve account balance at the beginning of the month. Note that it does NOT include this months activity. For NEW buildings the current reserve balances may be entered. After a building has been made ACTIVE, PropMan maintains these balances. Notes - This data is not used by PropMan. It is maintained and displayed for the user. MORTGAGEE SCREEN The Mortgagee screen holds information about the balance and payments for mortgages. PropMan will track up to five mortgages per building. See figure C-32. PropMan uses the data on this screen to generate automatic mortgage payments and to maintain the mortgage balances. At the beginning of each month, for each building, an invoice is generated for each mortgage. This screen provides the information needed to calculate the amount and distributions for the invoice. The fields on the Mortgage screen: Mortgagee Number: - Each building can have up to 5 mortgagees. The number also corresponds to the T.D. numbers in the Chart of Accounts. The 1st Mortgagee holds the 1st T.D. The balance is the 1st T.D. Principal and the activity is recorded in accounts 2010 Principal, 2110 Interest and 2210 Impounds. And, to belabor the obvious, the 2nd mortgagee holds the 2nd T.D. and the activity is recorded in accounts 2020, 2120 and 2220. Vendor: - This is the Vendor Number of the mortgagee for this mortgage. PropMan handles mortgagees as vendors. Mortgage payments are their invoices. This means that each mortgagee must be in the Vendor List and will have a Vendor Number. If there is no vendor entered, PropMan will not generate mortgage invoices. Name: Phone: Address: - If a valid Vendor Number is entered above, these fields are displayed from the Vendor List. Loan No: Terms: - These fields are not used by PropMan. They are maintained and displayed for the user. 4 - 38 Due Day: - This is the day of the month when the payment is due. The invoice for the mortgage payment will be due on this day. Loan Balance: - This is the loan balance at the beginning of the month. Note that it does NOT include this month's payments. For NEW buildings, this balance may be entered. After a building is ACTIVE this balance is maintained by PropMan. This balance is maintained according to invoices paid, even if PropMan did not generate the invoice. Loan Interest Rate: - The percentage interest rate. PropMan will use this to distribute the loan Payment, below, between interest and principal. Payment Prncpl & Int: - PropMan will distribute this amount between principal and interest on the mortgage invoice. It uses the Loan Balance and Interest Rate from this screen. PropMan will handle interest only and negative amortization loans. If the payment does not cover the interest payment, the excess interest is added to the principal and no principal payment is made. Payment Impounds: - If there is an Impound payment PropMan will include it on the mortgage invoice. PropMan keeps track of the amount paid to impounds but it does not do the accounting for the impound account. Payment Total: - The total of the Principal & Interest and Impound payments is displayed by PropMan. UNIT ID'S SCREEN The last building screen contains the Unit IDS for the building. See figure C-33. In Building Changes this is a review only screen. Unit ID's can be entered only when New Building Start Up is run. If the ID's are wrong, the New Building Start Up must be rerun for the building. The fields on the Unit ID screen: Number of Units: - PropMan keeps a count of the units in the building. The Unit Id's. - The ID's are shown in 10 rows of 5 ID's per row. Page 4 - 39 is intentionally left out. 4 - 40 NEW BUILDING START UP SCREENS The New Building Start Up and Building Changes operations both use the same set of screen formats. The same data, building background information, is handled by both. New Building Start Up is for the initial entry of data about buildings that are new to the PropMan system. It reserves space for all of the necessary files for units, tenants, invoices and so on and so on. Building Changes is used to change information about buildings that have already been entered into the system. Building Changes screens precede New Building Start Up in this manual. See figure C-34. When the start up operation is begun, only one field is accessible, in the heading: Building: - New Building Start Up establishes building numbers as valid buildings in the system. Any three digit building number between 100 and 999 is accepted. After the building number is entered PropMan searches to see if that number is already in use. This is to determine which of two warnings to display. THE WARNINGS The purpose of the warnings is to remind the user that a new building is going into the system. This is a last chance to get out if that was not intended. The simple warning says that the building number is not in use and if you continue, a building using that number will be started in the system. See figure C-35. The only field on the screen is: Startup Building: - The 'N'o answer returns to the System Maintenance menu. No data was recorded or changed. The 'Y'es answer calls up the General information screen and the start up is in progress. A different warning is displayed when the building number is already in use. The name and status of the building currently using this number are shown in the warning. If you continue data about this current building may be lost. See figure C-36. The only field on the screen is: Startup Building: - The 'N'o answer allows you to reenter the building number. No data was recorded or changed. The 'Y'es answer begins the start up process. Since this building already exists, there is some old data about it already. The restart continues with a question about this old data. When PropMan restarts a building, it always resets to blank or zero all unit information and all tenant information. The data on the building screens (General, Mortgagee and Unit ID's) are usually kept, but may be set to blank/zero if desired. PropMan will keep this existing information from the building screens unless told to set it to blanks. PropMan asks if the existing data should be cleared. 4 - 41 The only field on the screen is: Clear data: - The 'N'o answer leaves the existing building data as is. The 'Y'es answer sets all of it to blanks as if the building were being entered for the first time. In either case, after the answer is given, the General information screen is displayed and a start up is in progress. GENERAL INFORMATION SCREEN This screen is the same as the Building Changes, General information screen. See figure C-31. All fields operate the same as described under Building Changes with one exception. During New Building Startup the Status is set to NEW and cannot be changed. MORTGAGEE SCREEN The Mortgagee screen for New Building Start Up is identical in operation to this screen for Building Changes for NEW buildings. See figure C-32. Remember that during start up process the Status is always NEW. UNIT ID'S SCREEN For New Building Start Up, this screen is used to enter the identifiers for the units in the building. It has the same format as the ID's screen for Building Changes. See figure C-33. The ID's may be entered in any order. PropMan will check for duplicates as they are entered and will sort them into sequence when they are all entered. During start up is the only time ID's may be entered. They may not be changed or added to unless the building is restarted. An ID should be entered for each unit or item that is individually rented. Enter ID's for vacant units. If a single tenant occupies multiple spaces that at other times will be occupied by multiple tenants, enter ID's for all of the spaces. The fields on the screen are: Number of units: - PropMan keeps this count as you enter ID's. The Unit Id's. - The ID's are shown in 10 rows of 5 Id's per row. The ID's are entered row by row and each position must have an entry in order to go to the next. Duplicate ID's are rejected if they are entered. PropMan accepts virtually any combination of symbols for ID's and then standardizes the ID format as best it can. It recognizes numbers and letters; the fractions 1/4, 1/2 and 3/4 (when entered with three keystrokes); mixed letters/numbers. Here and elsewhere in the system, as long as the ID is recognizable, PropMan will accept the entry and standardize the format. (Examples: 309A, 309 a, 309-a are all accepted and standardized into 309-A: 71/2, 7 1/2 and 7-1/2 are all 7-1/2). 4 - 42 Id's may be entered in any sequence. When the user leaves the screen, they are sorted by PropMan into an ascending sequence Enter the numbers, letters or both that you use to identify the units in the building. As you enter the Ids PropMan will count the units in the building. Each building starts with a single unit with the same number as the building. For single unit buildings. you may leave this. Otherwise, type over this number with the first unit in your building. 4 - 43 SYSTEM PARAMETERS SCREEN PropMan needs some general information about the user and the computer in order to run. This is rarely changed once the system is installed. See figure C-38. The System Parameter fields are: Propman release: - As improvements are made to PropMan newer releases are made. This is set when the program disks are made up for distribution. If you ever call phone support for help with PropMan, we will need to know which release of PropMan you are running. Serial: - This is the serial number of your copy of PropMan. It is set when the program disks are made up for distribution. If you ever call phone support for help with PropMan, we will need to know the serial number of your copy. Buildings: Units: - These two fields are a count of the number of ACTIVE buildings and the total units in those buildings. This does not include NEW or DELETED buildings or their units. Report Heading: - This is the letterhead for reports and letters. Function Key Type: - PropMan has two keyboard layouts for function keys, one for 10 keys, left side and one for 12 keys, across the top. Use Next/Prev Function Key Type, function keys to select the layout that matches your keyboard. All functions are available from both keyboards, but the graphic display and the use of the keys are different. Date Format: - PropMan will display dates in American (MM/DD/YY) or European (DD/MM/YY) format. Use Next/Prev Date Type function keys to change the format. When a change is made all dates in the system are changed. Currency Symbol: - You may use any currency symbol desired in your printed reports. Use the Next/Prev Symbol function keys to step thru the characters. PropMan displays the character and the ASCII code value. If your printer has a different character set than the display screen, select the code for the character you want printed. Color set: - A colorset is a combination of colors used to display the various kinds of data. See the Data Type fields on this screen. There are 5 color sets. Number 1 is for mono monitors, 2 and 3 are for color displays. None of these can be modified. Color sets 4 and 5 may have the colors for each kind of data specified individually by the user 4 - 44 Frgrnd: Bkgrnd: - The foreground color is the color that is used to write the letters and numbers etc. The background color is the color that fills in the space around the symbol that was written. A typewriter normally types black letters on white paper. The foreground is black, the background white. PropMan allows each different kind of data to have the foreground and background specified. See the F1 Help to see the colors. The Data Types. - The different types have different allowable colors. The colors may be used any way desired. But, for any one data type the foreground and background must be different colors. Titles - The line on the screen saying "PropMan" and the line giving the screen title (in this case System Parameters) are the Titles. Labels - The words that identify the data items or fields on the screen are labels. Heading: is a label on this screen so is Frgrnd:. Name - On the second line of the screen is the Name of the owner of this PropMan system. Disply - Data that PropMan maintains is display only. The user cannot directly enter or change this data. The cursor does not move to these fields. The Building and Unit counts are Display data. Input - Data that the user can enter or change directly is Input data. The cursor will move to these items. The Heading is Input data. Prompt - At the lower left of the screen there is always a prompt. It tells the user what kind of data PropMan expects to be entered. Error - On the line above the prompt, error messages are displayed when PropMan is given bad or unexpected data. Clock - In the upper right hand corner is a clock showing the date and time as set in your computer. Help - The F1 Help shows the graphic key display and the built in reference manual. Calc - The three memory calculator is called up by the F2 key. 4 - 45 PURGE FILES SCREEN See figure C-39. PropMan accumulates some data indefinitely. In order to release disk space for reuse, some of this older, outdated data should be purged from time to time. Once a year should be sufficient for most users. Building data can be kept for old buildings as long as desired. Tenant data on old tenants should be purged from all buildings at least yearly. If a building has a high turnover rate, its tenant data should be purged more often. The F1 Help has warnings for each of these purges. The fields on the Purge Files screen: Buildings Num Name - The purge may be run on ALL buildings or on up to 5 specific buildings. If any building numbers are entered, the names are displayed. The different purges have different rules for the Status of the buildings allowed. If a building has an incorrect Status, the error is given when the purge operation is requested. Purge Buildings: - When a building is purged all record of it is removed, including archives. All of the space used by the building is released. Only DELETED buildings can be purged. If ALL is entered for Buildings Num, above, all buildings are examined and any with a Status of DELETED are purged. If specific building numbers are entered, only those that are DELETED will actually be purged Purge Tenants: - PropMan keeps data about old tenants indefinitely. After a tenant has moved and been given any deposit refunds, the data can be discarded. The tenant purge will examine the PREVIOUS tenants in the indicated buildings. Any tenants who have moved out and been given their final refunds will be removed from the records. See the Close switch on the Tenant Financial screen. This purge does not release the space back to DOS. Instead PropMan retains the space and reuses it when needed for new tenants. 4 - 46 REFERENCE LISTINGS MENU See figure C-40. Reference Listings are reports that, in general contain either, a large amount of data, detailed data or data that changes seldom or slowly. These are not usually needed as part of the monthly building operations. For each of the reports you may select "P"rinter, "S"creen or "N"o. "P" sends the report to the printer. "S" sends the report to the display screen with a pause after each screen. "N" skips the report and the cursor goes to the next field. While the reports are printing the prompt at the bottom of the screen changes to "Press 'S' to stop." If the 'S' is pressed PropMan will stop printing. Your printer may continue to print for a page or two depending on the size of its print buffer. When you interrupt a print it may take a from a few seconds to a minute for PropMan to reset itself before accepting your next command. General - Reports that pertain to the entire system are selected from here. Building - This screen provides a selection of reports pertaining to specific buildings. Unit / Tenant - These reports are about specific units in a building or about the occupants. 4 - 47 GENERAL LISTINGS These are listings that pertain to the system as a whole or by their nature contain data about all buildings. See figure C-41. The selections under General Listings are: Print Vendor List: - This lists all vendors in the system and prints all of the data in the Vendor List for each vendor. Print Chart of Accounts: - The Chart of Accounts is printed showing all accounts and indicating which are the fixed accounts. This will be the common chart of accounts for all buildings. Print Telephone List: - An alphabetized phone book is printed. It includes all persons in the system; vendors, tenants, employees, etc. 4 - 48 BUILDING REFERENCE LISTINGS These are detail listings of building data and building specific activity. See figure C-42. The fields for the Building Reference Listings: Buildings Num Name - Listings may be requested for All buildings or for up to 5 specific buildings. If any building numbers are entered the names are displayed. Print Invoice Detail: - All Invoices and their charge distributions for the current Processing Month are listed. Print Receipts Detail: - Miscellaneous Receipts for the current Processing Month are listed. Print Corrections Detail: - Account Corrections for the current Processing Month are listed. Print Building Background: - The building information is listed. This contains all of the background data that is entered and maintained by the New Building Start Up and Building Changes screens. 4 - 49 UNIT /TENANT REFERENCE LISTINGS These reports can be selected by building but the data concerns records kept about specific units or tenants. See figure C-43. The fields for Unit / Tenant Reference Listings are: Buildings Num Name - Listings may be requested for All buildings or for up to 5 specific buildings. If any building numbers are entered the names are displayed. Unit ID Tenant - For Unit or Tenant listings, the Unit ID is specified here. Listings may be requested about ALL units or one specific unit. If more than one building number or 'ALL' is entered for Buildings Num, above, then All is required here. If an ID is entered the name of the current tenant is shown. Print Tenant Rent Roll: - This is a set of worksheets with each building listed separately. Each tenant is shown along with their Paid To date and amounts due. Print Full Tenant History: - This lists all information about the current and all previous tenants in the units and buildings specified. It contains the data displayed and maintained by the Tenant Activity screens. Print Tenant Phone List: - This is an alphabetical listing of tenants and their phone numbers. Print Unit report: - The records on file about the specific units are listed. This is the data that is maintained by the Unit Changes screen. Print Vacancy Report: - All vacant units and all units with a move out date entered are listed. Print Lease expiration report: - All units with a lease expiration date in the next 3 months are listed. 4 - 50 ARCHIVE REVIEW MENU See figure C-46. PropMan keeps a detailed history of each tenants payment activity with the tenants' records. All other financial activity for the buildings is archived here. PropMan continuously maintains archives for the most recent 11 months of accounting activity. It also maintains archives of Year-End accounting data indefinitely. The 11 monthly archives contain the monthly accounting reports and detail transactions for each month. The Year-End archives contain only the year end accounting reports. In general the on screen reviews of archived data have the same format as the data entry screens for that data. Of course the archives may be reviewed only. No changes of any type are allowed. Income / expense recap - This is the summary monthly recap for any of the last 11 months or any previous year. Invoices - The invoice detail for the last 11 months can be reviewed on screen. Miscellaneous receipts - The receipts for the last 11 months can be reviewed on screen. Account corrections - The corrections for the last 11 months can be reviewed on screen. Print archived data - Archived data can be selected for printing. 4 - 51 INCOME / EXPENSE RECAP This is the same format as the Income / Expense Recap on the Month End Operations menu. See figure C-14. Archived recaps never have Cash on hand. Cash or shortages are always resolved at each month end. There are no archives of year-to-date recaps. The fields on the screen: Review Mth - There are Next/Prev Review Month function keys to step through the months. Between December and January the display reads "Year end" and the user may enter the year to see year-end data. The remainder of the fields are the same as the Income/Expense recap in Month end operations. 4 - 52 INVOICE SCREEN This is the same display as the Invoice entry screen. See figure C-5. There will be no UN-PAID invoices, as all invoices must have been PAID or put on HOLD or the month would not have been closed. The fields on the screen: Review Mth - There are Next/Prev Review Month function keys to step through the months. There are no year end invoice archives. The remainder of the fields are the same as the Invoice screen in Daily operations. No invoices may be added or changed. 4 - 53 MISCELLANEOUS RECEIPTS This is the same screen as the Miscellaneous Receipts entry screen. See figure C-9. The fields on the screen: Review Mth - There are Next/Prev Review Month function keys to step through the months. There are no year end miscellaneous receipts archives. The remainder of the fields are the same as the Miscellaneous Receipts screen in Daily operations. No receipts may be added or changed. 4 - 54 ACCOUNT CORRECTIONS This is the same screen as is used by the Account Corrections entry. See figure C-25. The fields on the screen: Review Mth - There are Next/Prev Review Month function keys to step through the months. There are no year-end account corrections archives. The remainder of the fields are the same as the Account Corrections screen in On Demand operations. No corrections may be added or changed. 4 - 55 PRINT ARCHIVED DATA See figure C-47. These reports are printed in the same format as the corresponding reports for the current month. Some are only available for monthly data others have monthly and year end figures. If you request a report for data that does not exist, it is ignored without raising an error. The fields on the Print Archived Data screen: Review Mth - There are Next/Prev Review Month function keys to step through the months. Between December and January the display reads "Year end" and the user may enter the year to see year-end data. Building Num Name - Listings may be requested for ALL buildings or for up to 5 specific buildings. If any building numbers are entered the names are displayed. Print Archive Recap: - The recap has the same format as the current month Income / Expense recap with the exception that only account activity is shown, no account balances. Print Archive Account Activity: - The archive report has the same format as the current months Account Activity statement with the exception that only activity is shown, no account balances. Print Archive Invoices: - This listing is in the same format as the Invoices Reference Listing. Print Archive Miscellaneous Receipts: - This listing is in the same format as the Miscellaneous Receipts Reference Listing. Print Archive Account Corrections: - This listing is in the same format as the Account Corrections Reference Listing. Pages 4 - 56, 4 - 57 and 4 - 58 are intentionally omitted. 4 - 59 NEW SYSTEM SETUP SCREEN There is one screen that is seen only when a PropMan system is newly installed. It allows the entry of an Initial Processing Month, see figure C-48. Initial Processing Month PropMan will start its record keeping with any Initial Processing Month desired. Once the record keeping begins, however, data must be entered and the Month End Close run for each month. The record keeping begins and the Initial Processing Month is established when the first building is given an ACTIVE status. See Status on the building General information screen. As long as the Initial Processing Month may be changed, this screen is shown every time PropMan is started. Once the first building is made ACTIVE, this screen is no longer shown. From then on the each month must be processed in sequence. The Processing Month will advance one month each tome the Month End Close is run. There are two fields on the screen: Month: Year: - The Initial Processing Month and year may be changed anytime until the first building is made ACTIVE. 5 - 1 Errors The word "errors" covers a lot of ground. In PropMan there are several levels of errors. Here we cover the least important first and then the next most important and so on. WRONG KEY The simplest error is pushing a key that isn't allowed right then. PropMan just beeps at you. The sound is a short, fast "beep-beep". You get this if you put letters in a number field or if you answer "J" when PropMan wants 'Y' or 'N' for a yes or no answer, and other, similar ways. It means that the key you pressed doesn't make any sense. No harm has been done. PropMan ignores the keystroke. Go on with what you were doing. ERROR MESSAGES Errors that give you meaningful messages are the most important. These errors are listed alphabetically in Appendix F, Error Messages. These messages are the way that PropMan tells you that it is confused. There are messages like "Invalid building number."; you asked for a building and there isn't one with that number. And "No letter format."; you tried to print letters or notices and there is no skeleton. When an error message is displayed, a drawn out two-tone sound is made. It goes "hiiiiigh-loow". Again, no harm done. Look at the error message and the help. Reenter the data, the function key, the menu selection or whatever. SEVERE ERRORS SEVERE I/O ERRORS These are errors that you should not see. They occur when an unanticipated situation arises. It could a be problem with the computer or the disk drive. It could be because PropMan has lost track of what it was doing or could not find some expected information. These can occur if 5 - 2 PropMan was not properly installed or if data was lost because of a power failure or computer problem while PropMan was running. If a severe error occurs the two-tone error horn sounds and the error message reads "Severe error" or "Severe I/O error" followed by a number. Often there will be several of these errors displayed in sequence as PropMan tries to extract itself from the situation. Copy down the sequence of errors and also make a note of which screen you were using and what operation you were trying to perform. This will help us, help you, if you need to call. Sometimes these severe errors have a very simple solution. If you encounter one of these, first look in Appendix F, Error Messages. The few common severe errors and their principal causes are listed. If you cannot find the error there or the error persists after you have tried to fix it, call PropMan telephone support. We will assist you in correcting the problem. A - 1 APPENDIX A INSTALLING PROPMAN Computer Considerations PropMan has certain minimum computer needs. It runs on IBM personal computers and compatibles with a minimum of 512K of memory, DOS 2.1 or greater, any hard disk and a printer. This includes PC's, XT's, AT's, portables and the PS/2. The size of hard disk needed is determined by the number of buildings, units, tenants, vendors, etc. that you work with, and the way your monthly activities are performed. In addition the disk must have sufficient space for any other software and data that you use. Here are some general guidelines for estimating disk space needs. About 10 to 20 per cent of this space is work space used only temporarily during some operations. These estimates are very generous. You will almost certainly use less space than shown here. Overhead - 1,000K once per system Building data - 180K times number of buildings Unit/Tenant data - 5K times number of units Examples: 1) 5 buildings totaling 120 units would use 2,500K or 2.5 megabytes. 2) 1 building with 175 units would use about 2,055K or 2.1 megabytes. 3) 20 buildings totaling 80 units would require about 5,000K or 5.0 megabytes. Installation and Upgrade PropMan is delivered in two ways; on two 5 1/4" floppy disks, or one 3 1/2" floppy disk. The information on these disks is highly compressed. In order to install PropMan on your computer you must use the PropMan installation program. This program will install, upgrade or remove PropMan from your computer. If you are not currently using PropMan, select INSTALL when the installation program asks for the operation. This will load PropMan onto your hard disk and set up an empty system with no buildings, tenants or vendors. If you are already using PropMan and have data that you want to keep, DO NOT re-install PropMan A - 2 over the existing PropMan system. The data in the existing system will be lost. If you currently have a PropMan system and want to keep your data while upgrading to a new release or more powerful version, select UPGRADE when the installation program asks for the operation. This will load the new PropMan software but will leave your data intact. After an installation or upgrade, the install program will check the CONFIG.SYS file and offer to change the FILES parameter, if necessary (PropMan requires a minimum of FILES=20). It will also ask if you would like to have batch files set up so that you may run PropMan by typing the command "PROPMAN" and back up PropMan by typing "PMBACKUP". See Appendix B for more information on backups. Do not run the installation from within Windows, XTree, PCShell or other shell programs. Depending on the configuration of your system there is a possibility of the installation not working properly. In order to avoid potential problems, run the installation program directly from the DOS prompt. After the installation PropMan itself runs from within these shell programs with no problems. To install, upgrade or remove PropMan: 1 Power up your computer in the normal manner. 2 Shut doiwn any shell or menuing program and get to the DOS prompt. 3 Insert PropMan delivery disk #1 in any drive. 4 Change to the drive with the delivery disk. 5 Enter the command PMINSTALL. 6 Answer the questions and follow the instructions from the installation program and it will install PropMan on your computer. Running PropMan the first time If the install program modifies the CONFIG.SYS file, you must reboot your computer before running PropMan for the first time. To do this, press the three keys Ctrl/Alt/Del at the same time. The computer will repeat its power up procedure. When it finishes PropMan will be ready to run. If the install program set up the PropMan batch file, enter the command: PROPMAN (Note: all one word). See the section Menus and Screens or the User Guide for help with the New System Start Up screens. From now on to use PropMan all that is needed is to enter the command PROPMAN from the root directory. If the install program did not create the batch file for you, change to the PropMan directory and run the program PROPMAN.EXE. B - 1 Appendix B Backups and Archives Backups and archives are not the same thing. The difference is especially important when dealing with computer systems. A backup is a contingency copy. Its purpose is to allow a recovery from a serious mishap, to allow the system to be restarted as of a certain point or date. Archives are historical data kept for review or analysis. Normally backup data cannot be reviewed or accessed directly, except to restore the system to a previous condition. Archive data is available for examination but normally is not complete enough or in the correct format to be used to reset the system to a previous condition. PropMan archives data automatically at each month end close. These archives may be accessed from the PropMan Archive Review Menu. Backups and restores for PropMan must be done by the user outside of the PropMan system. The procedure described here uses the BACKUP program that is part of your normal DOS. It will provide adequate backup for PropMan data. If you already have a backup procedure for your system, include PropMan data in that process. The DOS BACKUP can be slow and use many disks. There are faster backup programs available and techniques that you can use to speed up the backup process. Check at your local computer store. Backing Up Two batch files are provided with PropMan to help with the backup and (may you never need it) restore operations. Batch files contain a list of instructions for your computer's DOS. The command PMBACKUP will process a file containing a list of backup instructions. The command PMRESTORE will process a file containing a list of restore instructions. These commands are entered in the same way that you enter the command PROPMAN to run PropMan. See your DOS reference manual for information about any backup or restore messages. When you perform a backup you will need several blank, formatted disks. As you perform backups on your system, you will see how B - 2 many are required for your data. When using the normal 5 1/4" double sided, double density floppy disks, four disks plus one disk for each two buildings should be sufficient. Making a backup is quite simple: 1 Type in the command PMBACKUP 2 Follow the instructions and change disks when told. 3 Write the date and sequence number on the disk labels. When a backup is taken, all of the PropMan data and programs are copied. When a restore is performed, the data and programs are set to the status they had when the backup was taken. After a restore the only difference between the system at the time the backup was taken and the restored system will be the current date. Use backups to provide yourself with protection in depth. Over a period of months or years a large amount of data will reside on your computer (not just for PropMan, either). Loss of this data would be a major inconvenience, at least. It is comparable to losing your paper files to a fire. Most of the data is reproducible but at a large cost. Fortunately computer readable data is easily copied. Protection against its loss is achieved by making backup copies and caring for them. Back Up Schedule Here is an example of a backup schedule. By year end it will require 4 - 6 sets of backup disks. Each month as a last step before the month end close, take a backup. Keep at least two sets of backup disks. When making a backup don't overwrite the previous months backup. Never destroy your most recent backup in order to make a new one. For the months that end each quarter, take the backup to a physically different location (a fire could burn, or a burglar could take both the computer and the backups). Keep at least one quarterly backup in addition to the two sets of backups in No. 1, above. The December backup is your year-end data. Keep it for as it for as long as there is possibility of needing it. This is contains the data that you may need years from now for the IRS. Backups from such a schedule would allow the system to be restored to the end of either of the two most recent months, the end of the last quarter or the end of the last year. Only data that had been entered since the backup was taken would have to be reentered. If your system has a large amount of activity you may choose to take backups more often in order to minimize the data to be reentered after a mishap. B - 3 Formatting diskettes Before diskettes can be used by the computer they must be initialized or FORMATted. The FORMAT command is part of the DOS. For information about FORMAT see your DOS manual. The instruction here will show how to format diskettes for backup but it is not a tutorial on DOS. The actual operation is quite simple: 1 Type the command: FORMAT A: 2 Follow the instructions and put the disk to be formatted in the A disk drive. 3 When the format is complete a message will display: Format complete, Format another (Y/N)? 4 If you answer N the format program will stop. If you answer Y, the format program will repeat steps 2 and 3. This process normally only needs to be done for new disks. If the disk has information on it, this process will erase all of it. C - 1 Appendix C Menus and Screens In the printed manual this section contains examples of the menu and screen displays. It is omitted here to save space. D - 1 Appendix D Free Form Letters and Notices In order to provide flexibility, PropMan does not have the text for Three-Day or Change of Terms Notices built in. Instead PropMan uses skeleton letters and fills in the variable information for each recipient. The skeletons are easily changed using your own word processor. Free form letters may be one page in length. On the Notices/ Letters screen there are two selections that generate letters. To use any of these selections there must be a corresponding file containing the skeleton letter in the PROPMAN directory. PropMan is delivered with sample skeleton letters. Skeletons The skeleton letters are: 1 3-Day Notices uses the file THREEDAY.LTR. It produces one letter per unit for units with over due rent. The THREEDAY.LTR file supplied with PropMan is a skeleton of a Three Day Notice. 2 Rent-change Notices uses the file RENTCHNG.LTR. It produces one letter per unit for each unit with a rent change scheduled. The RENTCHNG.LTR file supplied is a skeleton of a formal rent increase notice. These .LTR files are text files and can be produced using your own word processor. They should be straight text with no control characters other that carriage returns. This format is variously called "text", "TXT", "ASCII" or "export" by different word processors. When letters are to be written, the skeleton is read and one copy is printed for each person or business in the selected group. PropMan recognizes keywords in the skeleton letter to know where to insert variable data in the printed letters. Keywords are replaced and everything else in the skeleton is printed. For example, in the skeleton you might write: "Your over due rent is now ==OVERDUERENT." D - 2 ==OVERDUERENT is a keyword. When the letter is printed the ==OVERDUERENT is replaced by the actual dollar amount that is over due. It would print as: "Your over due rent is now $455.30." Some keywords have no meaning in some letters. For example: Vendors have no ==OVERDUERENT. In a case like this it is treated as any other text and printed. All keywords start with two equal signs (==), are all upper case letters and must be followed by a space. You may use equal signs any way desired in the letters. If the text following the equals is not a keyword, the equals are printed just as any other text would be. Keywords may also be used in the letter. Without the two equal signs they are treated as any other text. Obviously, examination of the letters supplied with PropMan would be of great help in understanding how to use the free form letters. Just as obviously, it would be a good idea to copy them before trying to modify them. D - 3 Keywords The keywords are: ==BUILDINGADDRESS - On this line and the next three lines the address of the building is printed. ==BUILDINGNAME - The name of the building. ==CLIENTADDRESS - On this line and the next three lines the address of the owner of the PropMan system is printed. ==CLIENTNAME - The name of the PropMan owner. ==DATE - Today's date. ==FIRSTNEWDATE - First rent due day on which a scheduled change of rent will become effective. ==HEADING - The letterhead is printed, centered. ==NEWRENT - The new rent amount after a scheduled change. ==OTHERDUE - Non-rent money owed by the tenant. This is the Other Due amount from the Tenant Financial screen. ==OTHEROCCUPANTS - The names of other occupants in a unit. ==OVERDUERENT - All rent due thru the last rent due date. This is for 3 Day Notices. ==PROCDATE - The processing month and year. ==RENT - The current scheduled rent. ==RENTDUEDAY - Day of the month on which the rent is due. ==RENTDUETO - The last day for which the rent is now due. ==RENTDUEFROM - The rent due date on which this rent delinquency started. ==TOADDRESS - On this line and the next three lines the address of the letter's recipient is printed. ==TONAME - The name of the letter's recipient. ==TOPOFFORM - Does not print anything. It causes the the printer to skip to the top of a new page. E - 1 Appendix E Calculator In the printed manual this section contains instructions on the use of the on-screen calculator. It is omitted here to save space. F - 1 Appendix F Error Messages See Section 5, Errors, for a description of the different kinds of error indications used by PropMan. This appendix lists the operating error messages used by PropMan to indicate confusing or invalid data or commands. The Error Messages are listed here alphabetically. Building has an invalid status for this operation. Buildings may be NEW, ACTIVE or DELETED. Some PropMan operations are not allowed on some building statuses. See section 3, General Information, for a description of the different building statuses and which operation are allowed. Cannot close an empty batch. A deposit batch cannot be closed unless there has been some financial activity in the batch. A close was asked for but there have been no receipts or NSF checks since the last batch close. Close not allowed with no buildings in system. The month end close cannot be performed if PropMan doesn't have any buildings. If the processing month needs to be changed the New System Set Up screen can be used. Data and background colors cannot match. If the data and background colors were the same, the entire screen would be a single color. Nothing is readable when data is written in the same color as the background. Change the colors as desired but for any item the data and background may never be the same. F - 2 Deposit refunds cannot exceed deposit balances. A tenant may not receive a deposit refund in excess of their deposit balance. Disk full, data may be lost. PropMan tried to write new data to the disk, but there is no space. This is a serious error. Data may have been partially written or partially updated. The best course of action is to 1)restore PropMan from a backup, 2)delete outdated files from elsewhere on your computer, 3)run PropMan purges if there is outdated PropMan data in your system. Finally, reenter your PropMan data and retry the operation that failed. If this error occurs during New Building Startup, the restore is not necessary but the startup must be re-run. Disk not ready. The disk is not responding properly to PropMan's requests. This is usually caused either by a missing or too small FILES parameter in the CONFIG.SYS file or by improper installation of PropMan. See Appendix A, Installing PropMan. If PropMan was trying to write new data to the disk, this could be a serious error. Data may have been partially written or partially updated. The best course of action is to 1)restore PropMan from a backup, 2)fix the FILES parameter or other disk problem. Finally reenter your PropMan data and retry the operation that failed. If this error occurs during New Building Startup, the restore is not necessary but the startup must be re-run. Invalid account. The account either does not exist or it cannot be used here. You may be charging an invoice to an income account or trying to collect income into an expense account. Invalid batch number. There is no such batch number. Batches start at one and go up. This number has not been reached yet. Invalid building. The building number is wrong. No building in the PropMan system has that number. Invalid color. The color number entered is invalid, or it may be a good color but is not allowed for this item. Invalid colorset. The colorsets are numbered 1 to 5. You asked for something else and there isn't one. Invalid date. You have entered a date that does not exist; day or month zero, or month 13, day 35, etc. Or the date is not allowed because of other data; a tenant cannot move out before he moves in, etc. Dates are entered MM/DD/YY or DD/MM/YY, no punctuation. You may use leading zeroes or leading or trailing blanks. Invalid invoice. There is no invoice with this number for this building. Invoices are assigned numbers starting with one and going up. This number has not been reached yet. F - 3 Invalid number. A number is needed within a specific range (such as 1 - 5) and you have entered a number outside that range. Invalid unit ID. You have entered an ID that does not occur in the building being worked on. References to units in buildings may use only the IDs shown on the Unit Ids screen in Building Changes. IDs are specified in the New Building Startup operation. Invalid vendor. A vendor number that is not allowed has been entered. Vendor numbers are assigned starting at one and going up. You may have entered a number that has not yet been assigned. Or you may have entered the number of a DELETED vendor where only ACTIVE vendors are allowed. No archives available for the Month, Year, or Building requested. Check the building and date requested. Archives are available for the last 11 months and for previous year ends. Accounting detail and recaps are available for each month and year end. Invoices, Misc. Receipts and Account Corrections are available only by month. Archives are available for all buildings. However, if a DELETED building is purged from the system, its archives are removed also. No letter format. A free form letter or mass mailing was requested. There is no skeleton letter with the correct name available. No next tenant. In each unit there may be only one NEW tenant. There is no next tenant after this NEW tenant. No previous tenant. This is the oldest tenant data available. Data about any earlier tenants was either never entered or has been purged so that the space can be reused. Printer not ready. PropMan is sending data to the printer but the printer is not responding correctly. The printer may be turned off, off-line, out-of-ready, out of paper, jammed or the cables may be loose. Severe error ####. Severe I/O error ####. These errors are rare and should not occur during normal operation. If one does occur there will usually be several in sequence. Copy the number(s), then check NUMBERED ERROR MESSAGES, below. If you cannot solve the problem call PropMan phone support. See section 5, Errors. F - 4 System unit capacity exceeded. The various PropMan systems have different capacities in the total number of units that they can track at one time. This building cannot be activated because it would exceed the capacity of this system. Other buildings must be DELETEd to make room for this building. Perhaps it is time to upgrade to one of the more powerful PropMan systems. The Next Rent Date must fall on a Rent Due Day. You have entered a date that is not the same day of the month as the rent due day. The Next Rent Date is a rent change date. PropMan only allows rents to be changed in step with the normal monthly rent due day. Year end review not available for this selection. Only the Income / Expense recap and the Account Activity are maintained in year end archives. Activity detail like invoice or check register archives are maintained in the monthly archives. F - 5 Numbered error messages The following are the most common Sever Error and Severe I/O Errors. These are often have simple causes. If you encounter an error that is not here or if you cannot find the cause call PropMan phone support. 25 There is unreadable data in one of the files. If this is a new building, rerun the New Building Startup operation. Otherwise restore a backup. 1001 If you have just installed PropMan, the installation may have been incomplete. See Appendix A. 1002 See, Disk full. 1007 1009 See, Disk not ready. If you are re-running New Building Startup for a building that previously had startup errors, this may ignored when you re-enter the start up screens. If it occurs when you Escape from the start up screens, the error has not been fixed. 1026 1027 1028 Check the CONFIG.SYS file for a valid SHELL= parameter. If you have updated your DOS version, there may be some system files from the old version that were not updated. 2129 2135 2136 These are caused by errors in the tenant file. Data about one or more tenants may have been lost. PropMan has attempted to fix the error in the file. A single occurrence of this error means the file was damaged but has been repaired. If the error repeats, the file may not be recoverable. Index User Guide Reference Manual Account Balances 4-20 closing at Month End 4-24 names 4-33 see also Chart of Accounts Accounting Activities 3- 3 Accounting Corrections 4-30, C-25 entering 3.3 printing a list of 3.6 printing archived 5.5 reviewing archived 5.4 4-54, 4-55 Activating a New Building see Building, activiating Archives 3- 4, B- 1 account corrections 5.4 4-54 income and expense recaps 5.6 4-51 invoices 5.2 4-52 miscellaneous receipts 5.3 4-53 printing 5.5 4-55, C-47 Review Menu 4-50, C-46 reviewing 5.1 Backing Up PropMan 4.3 B- 1 Bank Deposits 2.15 4-17, C-10 Bills from vendors, see Invoices Building Changes 1.18 4-36 General screen 1.19 4-36, C-31 Mortgage screen 1.20 4-37, C-32 Units screen 1.21 4-38, C-33 Building Startup, New 1.13 4-40, C-34 - C-37 General screen 1.14 4-41, C-31 Mortgage screen 1.15 4-41, C-32 Units screen 1.16 4-41, C-33 Building Statuses see Status, building Buildings 3- 2 activating new 1.23 4-36 changing 1.18 general information 1.19 4-36, C-31 mortgage information 1.20 4-37, C-32 printing reference information 3.6 4-48 printing statements for 4.2 4-22 starting up new 1.13 unit identification 1.16 4-41, C-33 Index User Guide Reference Manual Calculator 2- 6, E- 1 Changing data 2- 5 see Entering see specific kind of data Chart of Accounts 1.11 3- 1, 4-33, C-28,29 printing 3.5 Closing Out the Month see Month End Colors 1.10 2- 4, 4-43 Computer needed A- 1 CONFIG.SYS A- 2 Daily Operations Menu 4- 4, C- 4 Deleting Buildings, see Status, building Vendors 3.8 see also Status, vendor Entering 2- 5 Invoices 2.7 4- 5 Rents 2.4 4- 7 Tenant Financial Transactions 2.5 4- 7 Tenant Personal Information 1.24 4-12 Tenants for New Buildings 1.17 Vendors 1.12 4-32 Errors 5- 1 messages F- 1 File Purges see Purge files Formatting diskettes B- 3 Free Form Letters and Notices see Letters and Notices Function Keys 2- 6 General Information 3- 1 Getting Started see Read Me First Index User Guide Reference Manual Glossary see Terminology Help 1.6 2- 2, 2- 6, C- 2 Income Expense Recap 4.1 4-19, C-14,15 reviewing archived 5.6 4-51, 4-55 Initial Processing Month and Year see Processing Month, initial Installing PropMan 1.3 A- 1 Invoices 4- 5, C- 5 changing 2.8 entering 2.7 review at Month End Close 4-23 reviewing archived 5.2 4-52, 4-55 paying bills 2.6 printing a list of 3.6 4-48 Letters and Notices 3.1 4-27, C-23, D- 1 Main Menu 4- 3, C- 3 Menus see Screens Miscellaneous Receipts 2.13 4-16, C- 9 entering 2.13 printing a list of 3.6 reviewing archived 5.3 4-53, 4-55 Month End Close 4.4 4-23, C-17 - C-21 Operations menu 4-18, C-13 Statements 4.2 4-22, C-16 Monthly Operations 2.1 4-18 Mortgage payments 1.20 see also Building, mortgage information Moving In / Out Tenants see Tenants, moving in/out New Building Startup see Building Startup, New New System Setup screen 4-58, C-48 Index User Guide Reference Manual On Demand Operations Menu 4-26, C-22 Paying Bills 2.6 see also Invoices Payment History see Tenant, payment history Printing Archived Information 5.5 Building Reference Listings 3.6 General Reference Listings 3.5 Notices and Letters 3.1 Reference Lists 3.4 Unit / Tenant Reference Listings 3.7 see also specific kind of data Processing Month 1.7 3- 1 advancing after close 4.4 during archive review 5.1 4-51 - 4-55 initial 1.7 4-59, C-48 Purge Files 3- 4, 4-45, C-39 Read Me First 1.1 1- 1 Reference Listings 3.4 Building 3.6 4-48, C-42 General 3.5 4-47, C-41 Menu 4-46, C-40 Unit / Tenant 3.7 4-49, C-43 Rent Overdue list 3.1 4-27 payments 2.4 4- 7 scheduling changes 3.2 4-10, C- 6 Reserve Account Activity 2.14 Reviewing Archives see Archives Screens 2- 3, 4- 1, C- 1 Shutting Down PropMan 1.5 2- 2 Starting Up PropMan 1.4 2- 1 Index User Guide Reference Manual Status building 1.25 3- 2, 4-36 invoices 2.8 4- 5 tenant 2.2 4- 8 vendor 4-32 System Maintenance Menu 4-31, C-26 System Parameters screen 4-43, C-38 Telephone list 3.5 4-47, 4-48 Tenants 3- 3 Activity 4- 7 deposit activity 2.5 4- 9 Financial screen 4- 7, C- 6 moving in 2.2 4-10 moving out 2.3 4-11 notices and letters 3.1 see also Letters and Notices Payment History 2.12 4-11, C- 7 Personal information 1.24 4-12, C- 8 reference listings 3.7 see also Reference Listings rent transactions 2.4 4- 7 setting up for new buildings 1.17 Terminology 1.2 Units 3- 3, 4-35, C-30 entering unit notes 1.22 Id's for 4-39, 4-41 printing information for 3.7 see Building Changes, Units screen see Building Startup, Units screen see Buildings, unit information Upgrades A- 1 Vendors deleting 3.8 see also Status, vendors entering / updating 2.11 4-32 List screen 4-32, C-27 printing a list of 3.5 4-47