Currency Considerations

The foreign currency application, available on Datafile Diamond and Premier, allows sales and purchases in currencies other than Pound Sterling (or more correctly your base currency). Whilst stock control itself is only concerned with base currency values how the currency cost and selling prices are derived will affect how you set up your stock pricing

Sales Order Processing. Sales Orders are entered in the currency of the customer account and the selling price confirmed is assumed to be that currency. There are two ways of configuring this – usually the prices recorded on the stock record are set in the base currency and the current exchange rate is used to multiply this price to calculate the currency selling price.This does have the disadvantage (to your customers) that prices fluctuate based on the exchange rate and that you may end up with prices such as $20.07 when you may operate with rounded prices. The second option is to assume that certain of the stock price bands are tied to a specific currency – i.e. price bands 1-3 are Sterling, 4-6 are US Dollars and 7-9 are Euros.

Purchase Order Processing. As above purchase orders are entered in the currency of the supplier account and the cost price confirmed is assumed to be that currency. Again the most common option is to have the cost price taken from the stock record and multiply it by the exchange rate. Alternatively, the last order price, if referenced, is taken to be the currency price but this would not be appropriate if the same stock item is purchased from more than one supplier in more than one currency. A third option allows the currency code and cost of your usual supplier to be recorded on the stock record – if a purchase order is entered for that currency then this cost price is used, if not then the standard cost price is multiplied by the appropriate exchange rate.

Notes

Invoicer

Invoicer allows both sales and purchase transactions to be generated and again prices and costs entered are expected to be in the currency of the customer and supplier accounts. Unlike the order processing systems there is no option to multiply prices set by the exchange so the prices selected have to be set for specific currencies. On sales invoices this means tying selected stock price bands to particular currencies and, for purchase invoices this means typing the currency cost in the invoice itself where appropriate.