Upgrades thru Profit Plan v2.3

Upgrades thru Profit Plan v2.3
Financial Software for the Business Professional

As with any good software product, Profit Plan has undergone continuous review and enhancement since first released in July, 1997. Good ideas are incorporated regularly... some small and others more extensive. Each edition grows slightly faster, more robust and/or flexible and user friendly than the one before. As a result, some of you already have many of the features listed below, while others have fewer.

Our Profit Plan v2.3 release began shipping in April 19, 1999. This edition included all of the enhancements listed below and was fully Y2K compliant. Select What's New in Profit Plan v2000 to see enhancements added between v2.3 and the entirely 32-bit Profit Plan v2000 edition released in April, 2000. Select What's New in Profit Plan v2000 SE for information on the Fall, 2000 upgrades. Or Select What's New in Profit Plan v2001 for information on the very latest features!

Profit Plan Power Boosts...

New construction industry data (SIC) input form added. This matches Robert Morris Associates Annual Statement Study format for contractors.

New Summary Totals Report provides detail roll-up of all accounts, as well as spread of fixed vs variable costs. Available for all periods in all horizons.

New Worksheet Tab provides empty Excel-like workbooks for use as scratch pads, import, and/or linking of special schedules into the Profit Plan Assumptions Sheets. This allows creation of detailed Personnel Planning models and any other spread of detail data needed to drive one or more of your forecast "assumptions".

New account types allow Interest located anywhere in the Income Statement.

New account types allow display of Prior Accumulated Retained Earnings, Current Period Earnings, as well as, or in lieu of, Accumulated Retained Earnings - Total.

New prompts appear in the Status Panel bar (at bottom of application window) to help you select the appropriate action from the main menu. Many provide helpful hints on usage as well.

New features in Assumption Designer include:

	Automatic *Trend Line* formulation. If the historical account data displays a reasonable trend, this can be extended into the forecast with a simple button click.
	New *Statistical Data* form includes averages, standard deviation, growth coefficient (slope of trend line), regression coefficient and coefficient of determination. This form provides the statistical basis for forecasting accounts, based on historical data.
	New *Point & Click* method simplifies building complex formulas to project account results.
	New *None* account type makes it easy to revert to default forecast assumptions. Apply the None assumption type. Then click the Reset Assumptions menu item to restore the now empty assumptions to default.
	New *Prior Period Percent Growth* assumption type added. This assumption type is used by default for projecting data for sales related accounts.
	New *Universal Numeric Format* option can automatically apply a numeric display format to all financial data on the Assumptions Sheet. Use to instantly round to dollars or thousands, or expose cents for accurate data entry.
	New *% Prior Annual Account* assumption type lets you build a Monthly, Quarterly, or Semi-annual forecast of an account from its prior annual data, rather than from the account's annual forecast value.
	New *Automatic Preview* displays the result of a new assumption or user-defined formula in the Designer field before the assumption is applied.
	New *Default field* displays the default value that would be applied to the selected field. For instance, selecting a % Growth assumption type immediately displays the prior period growth percentage in the Default field.

New features in the Loan Module include:

	*Reverse Mortgage* feature allows creation of a loan without scheduled payments.
	Now use 360 day or 365 day amortization schedules (or any other number of days in this range you feel partial to).
	Amortization schedule extends one year past end of forecast, for your convenience.

New Financial Statement Proofing features

	Verification that fixed and variable costs are within reasonable parameters.
	Summary Totals, Direct Cash Flow, Indirect Cash Flow, Sources and Uses, Cash Budget, and Proforma Cash Flow reports are all cross-checked to insure cash balances agree. This insures that account types assigned to the financial statements are internally consistent and properly applied.

New Reset Assumptions form provides more user control over this process by individually allowing:

	Reset of cosmetics only (copy underlines, fonts, colors from chart of accounts input form only).
	Recalculate assumptions (to clear residual error displays resulting from account type revisions requiring extended recalculation).
	Relink loans and capital asset sheets to the Assumptions Sheet.
	Turn on/off automatic Assumptions Sheet recalculation (to save time on slower personal computers.)

New Assumptions Sheet Tests warn of (or simply repair) damage inadvertently resulting from user actions.

Many new Learning Mode messages have been added to guide the user along the way. These informational messages pop up when relevant to warn, suggest, or simply inform the user. Once noted, the user can Cancel the message, so it will not appear again, or simply acknowledge it so that it will reappear the next time it is relevant.

Many techniques have been used to speed Profit Plan operations and lighten its footprint:

	Loan templates are added to a company model only if the Loan Module is accessed for that company model.
	A single set of universal Loan, Capital Asset, and Report templates are now used to dynamically create components of a new company as relevant. Significant hard disk savings resulted.
	Reports are refreshed or recalculated only when account structures or data changes warrant.

New Automatic Line Numbering is available via the Edit menu in the Account Setup tab. Several line numbering styles are available.

Continuous Zoom is now available to fit more of your model on the screen, or enlarge for easier viewing. These settings do not affect page layout.

Ready for Y2K. Retooling one of the date functions now allows Profit Plan to ignore your choice of short date format on the Windows desktop. So now, even if you choose to continue using mm/dd/yy, or the equivalent, Profit Plan will continue unaffected into the 21st century. (Editions prior to v2.22 required that the short date include four year digits, e.g. 12/31/2000 rather than 12/31/00.)

Security Development believes in the concept of continuous improvement. We do not rest on our laurels, but continuously improve and enhance our products. Should you have a thought, wish, or feature you would like to pass on or see added, please do not hesitate to tell us about it on our feedback page!

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Last modified: September 13, 2001