WCBS - Integrating Lightyear with WCBS

WCBS - Integrating Lightyear with WCBS

WCBS and Integrating with Lightyear


To enable PL Imports please contact WCBS support or your Account Manager to switch it on, once switched on you will find it in WCBS below

Please note - CSV Templates are attached to this article. Please use them when importing information to your Lightyear Account from WCBS.

Connect your Accountancy Software


Lightyear is an award winning automation application, but ultimately you will want to get your payables data into your accounting software.  In order to sync with your accounting software suppliers, tax rates etc, and send your purchase data to your accounting software, we will need to connect to your accounting software.  

Here's a video on how to connect your accounting software. 


Connect to your Accounting Software from Lightyear on Vimeo.


Lightyear allows you to export your bills in a pre-set CSV format, which can then be uploaded directly to WCBS.  

To get started, click the Cog icon in your left hand tool bar:

From the new options that appear, click Accounting Software:

Click this icon and in the window that appears select WCBS from the drop-down.


Once done, you'll need to start importing your settings from WCBS. Let's look at these individually

Accountancy Software Settings


Click into Accountancy Software Settings:

In Software settings you can choose which of the features you do or do not use. Here in the above screenshot I have all of the options as "YES".
Here is a rundown of each of these settings and what they do.
  1. Do you Use Departments - Enabled, you will be able to import your current departments from WCBS. When switched on, you will see a new "DEPARTMENTS" tab in the previous screen.

  1. Do you Use Budgets - Turning this option on if you use Budgets will enable another tab in your accountancy settings where you can upload budgets via CSV. (see screenshot below)

  1. Do you use Category 3 - If you use category 3, turning this option on will show and extra input box called reference, in panel 2.


Please Note: If this field is over 40 characters, upon export from Lightyear, this will truncate to 40 characters on the CSV as PASS has a character limit implemented on this field.
  1. Automatically apply categories on line item level- When this option is enabled, you will be able to show categories on each line of the extracted data. 
  2. Automatically apply Chart of Accounts on line item level? By default, Lightyear will automatically apply Account Codes at a line item level based on various rules. You can choose for this feature to be disabled by selecting No.
  3. Insert Lightyear Document Link Turning this on will add the URL of the Invoice in Lightyear to your CSV Export into PASS
Please Note: Before you turn this on in Lightyear, please make sure your PASS is updated to Version 2022.2 at least, and you have the setting enabled within PASS. If you need further help, please reach out to PASS Support.
To enable within PASS follow the below instructions:
  1. Go to Purchase > Options Maintenance > System Options > Additional Options (tab)
  2. Set the system to indicate ‘Electronic Document Capture’. The URL is: https://app.lightyear.cloud/viewInvoice/?showInvoiceId=
  3. The ‘Enable import’ must also be ticked to allow import of invoices via Purchasing > Invoicing > Batch Import
  1. Group Line Data? Turning this on will allow you to export Grouped Account Code data, rather than line item data. For the full article on this, click here.


All of the next steps in this setup section are completed by using a csv upload. The templates for these csv's are attached. Please download them and ensure the information is in the correct columns.

Supplier Accounts

Lightyear can add all of the supplier accounts from WCBS Accountancy Software via CSV. Once these are added, it is a simple case of activating them as you process your invoices. 
The below step shows how the CSV file should be prepared. The Supplier Accounts template is attached to this KB article. 

CSV Format -
Please ensure the CSV is in the correct format and delete all duplicates.
CSV Columns must be the same as below:
Column 1 - Supplier name Column 2 - Card ID 
Your CSV file should look like this:


These are your Accounts within WCBS, and are used so Lightyear knows which supplier to associate any given bill with. To set up a Supplier, you'll be asked for a Supplier Name and an Account Reference. The Supplier Name is just used as an identifier in Lightyear, but the Account Reference would need to be the 3 digit Account Reference code for that supplier within WCBS. 

You can edit any of the Suppliers by clicking on the Green pencil

You can bulk upload your supplier Accounts via the 'Upload CSV File' Option located above the supplier table.  




Chart of Accounts

Lightyear can add all of the Account Codes from WCBS Accountancy Software via CSV. These are then saved within lightyear and accessible immediately. The Account Code upload template is attached.

CSV Format - 
Please ensure the CSV is in the correct format and delete all duplicates.
CSV Columns must show as:
Column 1 - Code / Column 2 Description
Your CSV should look like this:

These are your Account Codes  within WCBS. Lightyear requires the 3 digit Account Code and a description or label to go along with these.

Tax Rates

All tax rates are also uploaded via CSV from WCBS. Once these are uploaded you must choose 2 tax Rates as defaults. One for Standard tax rate and another for tax free.

CSV Format - 
Please ensure the CSV is in the correct format and delete all duplicates.
Please ensure the CSV columns are in the correct order
Column 1 - Code Column 2 - Name of Tax Code/Description Column 3 - Tax Rate as number (so 10% would be 10 and should not have symbols)
Your CSV should look like this


Although you can add as many tax rates as you want, please note that you will only have one default taxed and one default tax free rate

.Enter your Tax Code from WBCS(TXX), a description and the rate. The In Use box will be checked by default, so it's ready to use as soon as it's created.


Once your Tax Rates are all uploaded, your tax rates screen will look like this:


Notice that I have ticked 1 default in each of the columns. A Default Tax Rate and a Default Tax Free.


Please note that all the above can be added quickly and easily using Bulk Upload.

You can now start exporting bills to WCBS. Please watch the video for more information:



WCBS Export Example

Let look at a comparison in Lightyear and WCBS of what the data looks like before exported and what we can see on the imported csv in WCBS.

Here is the data shown in Panel 2 before Export:



Once the Export to WCBS button is clicked, a CSV file will download of this invoice. (The video above shows what to follow to pull this csv into WCBS)

Here is an example of how the csv will look, and the data that will show.


The csv will not show all line data, rather all information needed from the invoice will be grouped by Account Code. For example if the above invoice had a split Account Code, each individual line would be grouped and show data relevant to those grouped Account Codes on one line. 

For Example, here we can see the split Account Code and the different Departments.


Exported, we can see these are set out into their relevant Account Codes if individually different. If the line detail is the same and matches both in Account Code and Department it will be grouped on the CVS. The Total of the entire invoice shows at the top, and each Account Code/Line total will be shown relevant to each beneath that total.


1 - Account Code
2 - Department number
3 - Invoice Total
4 - Line Totals

Type to the far left, shows H for beginning of an invoice and I for the Lines on that invoice.

Migrating Software?

Once you select WCBS as your software, you won't be able to change it. If you are thinking about changing accountancy software, please reach out to our Support team for guidance on how to do so.



      

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