For the millions of Americans, working from home was something of a luxury. Fast forward to today: Working from home has become a necessity due to COVID-19. This contagious virus has upended life for virtually everyone in the world. According to recent Gallup poll, 62% of employees have reported that they have worked from home during the current crisis. Prior to the COVID-19 crisis, 39% of employees reported that their employers offered them remote work options. Closed offices have forced businesses to adapt to what may become more of a new normal as employees and employers get used to a remote workforce.
Change rarely comes easy. However, Microsoft Dynamics 365 enterprise resource planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM) solutions which are cloud applications and thus designed for remote workers can simplify the transition to more remote workers and make it easier for clients to do business with your organization when they are also working from home. Here are just a few examples of how Microsoft Dynamics 365 and various integrated solution vendors’ applications help enable a remote workforce.
Improve or maintain sales
If there’s anything that has dramatically increased since the COVID-19 outbreak, it’s online purchases. This is for obvious reasons; because many retailers are closed – considered “non-essential” – buyers are confined to point-and-click shopping. Unfortunately, some platforms aren’t exactly intuitive, making for frustrated customers.
eCommerce add-on applications for Microsoft Dynamics 365 like Sana Commerce or Nomad eCommerce deliver seamless, online shopping experiences for customers with integrated solutions that also make it easy for organizations to sell and fulfill orders online. With these solutions, companies that normally sell in a traditional brick-and-mortar or call center setting can easily offer their products online.
Streamline payment methods
Consumers generally want options. This is especially true when it comes to how they spend their money. Indeed, according to Blackhawk Network, the most preferred payment method among shoppers today is via credit card.
Problems and frustrations arise – for customers as well as your remote personnel – if you don’t accept credit cards. However, through EBizCharge, which integrates with Microsoft Dynamics 365 products, you can accept virtually any credit card from anywhere. EbizCharge offers payment solution with an out-of-the-box integration with Dynamics that allows you to accept both credit and debit card payments, send email payment reminders to customers, automate payment collections, and deploy a customer portal where they can pay their own invoices with their credit cards or ACH payments. The interface is intuitive and allows users to enter credit card information both securely and conveniently. Money is received faster and this capability eliminates the dependency on the post office for other payment-related transactions, such as sending out invoices or customers mailing checks.
Simplify document management
While more businesses are going paper-free, physical documents will never go away entirely. But the swift, forced transition from in-office to work-from-home settings has made document management more complicated, given hard copy documents originally presumed to be readily available suddenly aren’t, with many offices now closed until further notice.
PaperSave’s Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central add-on solution offers cloud-based AP automation, workflow and document management that enables employees to more efficiently work remotely and in the office. Their solution leverages OCR which reduces data entry and errors, can capture invoices by monitoring emails accounts, and allows employees to securely approve and access documents from a desktop browser or mobile device.
Perform payroll with breathless ease
Every employee depends on getting their paychecks. And it’s especially important in these uncertain times, that preparing and submitting payroll be easy and cloud friendly for employers.
With the Greenshades Payroll & HR Platform employees responsible for payroll get a dashboard that provides both a simplified view of the last payroll by category, as well as one-click access to details on any of your previous runs. You can also look ahead to upcoming payroll runs and even initiate a run. A post payroll snapshot also provides options for additional steps, all according to relevant workflows, policies, procedures, and laws. It offers flexibility and control, all while mitigating compliance risks.
The payroll solution will properly assign taxes, manage multiple jurisdictions and reciprocity, and execute flawless returns all online. Tax payments will be timely, and returns will accurate from the very first time they’re submitted. Employees also love this solution because they can self-access and update their own employee profiles, payroll stubs and tax information online. Greenshades even offers a mobile app to make the experience even convenient.
The Dynamics silver lining
These are very challenging and complicated times for business owners and their personnel. However, every cloud has a silver lining. Microsoft Dynamics 365 and it’s numerous integrated solutions like the few we’ve highlighted here offers a comprehensive platform that can make your employees every bit as productive and efficient from their home base as their workplace.
If you’re ready to make an ERP transition – or get more out of the Microsoft Dynamics that you already have in place – The TM Group is happy to help. Contact us today; we’ll help you apply the business solutions that best help your organization to work more efficiently both inside and outside the office.
https://blackhawknetwork.com/trends-in-consumer-retail-and-payment-preferences/
https://news.gallup.com/poll/306695/workers-discovering-affinity-remote-work.aspx
https://dynamics.folio3.com/2018/10/30/the-ultimate-guide-to-hr-payroll-processing-in-dynamics-365/
https://ebizcharge.com/payment-solutions/virtual-terminal/
