Setup Notes for New Users

For existing Sunpac users: Please see notes below or contact support for setup assistance.

Notes About Inventory Groups and Categories

There are several different ways of grouping inventory items. They have different purposes:

• Account Categories are used for accounting purposes when updating the general ledger. These groups would correspond to the General ledger expense codes, such as Purchased Food or Supplies.

  • Account Categories are used along with Account Mapping when creating journal entries for Purchase Orders, Invoices and Summary Period Close.
  • All the items that use the same general ledger expense and asset codes would be tied to the same Account Category.
  • Examples of Account Categories are Food Purchases, Food Processing Supplies, and Supplies and Materials.

• Bid Groups are for grouping items for bid processing and purchasing within Inventory. Bid Groups do not need to match the Account Categories.

  • Milk and Bread could be different Bid Groups but assigned to the same Account Category.

Example: Food and Supplies could be in the same Bid Group but assigned to different Account Categories.

• Tax Groups allow you to apply different sales tax rates to different items.

• Item Groups can be used to group similar inventory for special purposes.

Example:If you want to be able to see a list of the items you only serve at breakfast, you could put them in a Breakfast Item Group. They could still be in the same Bid Group as other purchased foods.

New Meals Plus Inventory Users

Set up Inventory Sites and Users: Before you begin working in Meals PlusInventory you will need to set up Licensing for your school sites, and at least one authorized Inventory user. This is done in System Management.

Then you are ready to set up the Administration options in Inventory. Please review the detailed instructions for the following topics:

• Control File: Select either Perpetual or Summary inventory method.

• Site Setup: Your school sites will be listed here, based on your licensing information. If you use a warehouse, this is where you set it up.

• Inventory Groups and Categories: These are optional but will help you manage your inventory. Please see below for more information.

• Vendor Setup: You will need at least one vendor.

• Item Maintenance: This is where you set up your inventory items.

Sunpac

If you have been using Meals PlusInventory and plan to interface directly to Sunpac, please contact Meals Plus Support for special instructions.

LINQ Users (LINQ Fund Management, Windows version)

If you are using Meals Plus Inventory with LINQ , you can interface directly to LINQ.

Initial setup for interfacing to LINQ  

You will also need to have access to Meals Plus Financial to set up Meals Plus Inventory.

1. Meals Plus: Financial: Administration: Control File: Set the GL Type to LINQ and set the Configuration Utility to point to the location of the LINQ Fund Management database.
2. Meals Plus: Financial: Utilities: Import Account Info from LINQ for the current Fiscal Year. This sets up the Account table in Meals Plus Finance.
3. Inventory: Utilities: Item file setup: Import Item File of Inventory Items, or manually enter items here.
   • It will set up Inventory Account Categories based on the first digit of the item code and link the items to the standard categories.

   Example:If an item code starts with two (2), it will set up Account Category 2 automatically and link all those items to it.

   • After the import is done, you can go into Inventory Account Category Setup and edit the Descriptions to make them more meaningful. For example, category 3 could be renamed to “Food Processing Supplies.”
   • It will also set up all the Bid Group numbers. You can add descriptions to the Inventory Bid Groups under Bid Group Setup.
4. Taxable Items: If you have taxable items, set up a Tax Group with the rate that applies. Then go into Item Maintenance and assign the taxable items to that tax group.
5. Item Maintenance Review: Verify that your items are set up correctly. Example: you can use the Account Category filter to be sure that all items are assigned correctly.
6. Inventory Accounts: Set up the account mapping for each Account Category and Site. This links the Account Categories to the general ledger account codes to be used when updating Purchase Orders, Invoices and Period Close.
7. Verify any existing Transactions and On Hand Inventory. If you have already been using Meals Plus Inventory, check the existing data for accuracy. 
   • Ensure the inventory values are correct and match the LINQ account balances. If there are any problems, it may be better to erase the old data and start fresh.

Please contact Meals Plus Support if you have any questions.

Getting Started

Once the basic setup is completed under Administration, you are ready to start entering Orders and Transactions.

• Perpetual Inventory: If you are using Perpetual Inventory, start by entering and updating a Physical (under Transactions) for each site to establish a beginning inventory.

  • The date should be the day before you plan to start entering other transactions.
  • Then you can begin to do Orders, Receiving and Usage transactions to track your inventory on a daily basis.
    • Enter your transactions in the correct sequence (by date) whenever possible. On Hand quantities and values will be updated automatically based on your entries.

• Summary Inventory: You can start with either Orders or Physicals.

  • Use Utilities: Import Item File to update the Inventory Item file.
  • On Hand inventory is not tracked with Summary Inventory.