Copyright: Copyright (c)1997 Zoom Systems


ExpensePro Help Index

What is ExpensePro?

A Quick Tour

Creating a new Expense Report

Specifying Expense Report Title

Specifying Expense Report Date and Purpose

Selecting Expense Report Template

Specifying Other Expense Report Options

Selecting Itemized Expenses Option

Finishing Expense Report Wizard

Filling the Expense Report

Itemizing Expenses

Printing Expense Report

Print Preview

Printer Setup

Direct Printing

Sending Expense Report Using Email

Other Features

Customizing Expense Report Templates

Currency Exchanger

Entering Mileage Conversion Factor

Setting Password

User Setup

Support

Customized Expense Reports

Purchasing ExpensePro 1.1

Copyright ©1997 Zoom Systems


What is ExpensePro?

Welcome to ExpensePro for Windows95 and Windows NT. ExpensePro is designed to help you easily create your expense reports. It offers the traditional spreadsheet like interface for you to specify your expenses. The expense report can be customized to have your company name, department name and project title. It also classifies your expenses in two categories: the ones paid by you, and the ones paid by the company. Taking into account the total expenses, cash advanced to you by the company and the company paid expenses, it calculates the actual amount owed to you by the company. You can also itemize the expenses by specifying where are why were the expenses incurred. The program will print a separate list for itemized expenses.

In addition to the above basic functions, ExpensePro can be used to convert amount from various currencies when you want to enter an expense incurred in a foreign currency. You can save your expense report to disk or email directly from the program. For security purposes, you can password protect your expense reports, so that only you and the authorised people can open it.


Support

ExpensePro is a very simple program and you should have no problems running it if you know how to use a Windows program. If you do have questions or want to contribute suggestions, please contact us via one of the following means:

Email:	zoom@saxena.com

Mail:	ZOOM SYSTEMS

6757 Arapaho, Suite 711-136

Dallas, Texas 75248.

Or Visit us at our WWW site at www.saxena.com/zoom for a FAQ and information about upgrades. Trial copies of our other programs can also be downloaded from our web site.


A Quick Tour

Now that you are familiar with what the program does, the next few pages will take you on a quick tour of ExpensePro. The purpose of this tour is to acquaint you with the organization of ExpensePro window, the toolbar and the menu. Each of the operations described below are discussed in detail in the coming chapters. This tour should take just a few minutes.

Starting ExpensePro

When you installed ExpensePro a new menu entry was created in the Start Menu for Windows95. You can open ExpensePro group from the start menu and run ExpensePro by double-clicking on it.

When you start the program for the very first time, the following dialog appears. Every expense report needs the user's name, company name and the department. This is considered user setup information. Instead of entering this information each time you run the program, you can enter it now and the program will remember it everytime it creates a new expense report. You should select 'Yes' from the dialog.

Figure 2.1

Selecting 'Yes', brings up the actual 'User Setup' dialog.

User Setup

Enter the information and click on 'OK' to continue. Check 'Always print itemized expense attachment' if you normally want to print the itemized expenses. Itemized Expenses are the expenses which are described in detail like where were they incurred, why and who else was involved in the expense.

Figure 2.2

After this a ExpensePro guidance dialog displays which you can use to specify whether you want to create a new expense report, open an existing report or work on your own.

Figure 2.3

If you do not want to see this dialog everytime you run the program, you should check the item 'Don't show me this screen again' before selecting one of the three options.

If you selected "Create a new Expense Report" a Expense Report Wizard will guide you through the process, step-by-step. See Chapter 3, "Creating an expense report" for further documentation on how to use the wizard. If you selected  "Open an existing Expense Report", you will be presented the "File Open" dialog where you can select the file you wish to open. Clicking on continue will bring an empty expense report and then you are on your own. The empty ExpensePro window looks like following:

Figure 2.4

Figure 2.5

You can use File | New, File | Open or File | Exit menu item now to proceed.

The Toolbar

ExpensePro provides a toolbar with buttons for frequently used commands. This section will describe the use of the toolbar buttons.

Figure 2.6


Creating a new Expense Report

You can create a new expense report by using the Expense Report Wizard. Expense Report Wizard walks you step-by-step through the process of creating a new expense report. You can start the Expense Report Wizard either using the File | New menu or selection 'Create new Expense Report' from the ExpensePro guidance dialog (see Figure 2.3). The wizard collects the vital information for the expense report in 5 easy steps before presenting the expense report for you to fill in the numbers.

Step I. Specifying Expense Report Title

In step I, you are prompted to specify the title you want to use on your expense report. Type the title in the text field and select 'Next' to proceed to next step.

Figure 3.1

Step II. Specifying Expense Report Date and Purpose.

In step II, you are prompted to specify the start date of the expense report, trip purpose, project and department. You only need to pick the start date as the other three are automatically picked up from  the information you specified in User Setup dialog (see Figure …) when you first ran the program. Type in the new start date or click on the small button next to the date text field to popup a calendar to help you select the date. As you select the date, the day of the week for that date is shown right below the date field. At this point you may also modify the other information displayed in the dialog. After specifying the date and other information, select 'Next' to proceed to next step.

Figure 3.2

Figure 3.3

Step III. Specifying Expense Report Template.

A template is the list of all the categories and sub-categories you have in your expense report. This is the most important step in the process of creating an expense report for two reasons: 1. How your expense report looks and what categories it contains is decided by the template you choose for the expense report and 2. Once chosen, the template cannot be changed for the current expense report.

A list of available templates is shown in the drop-down combobox. Select the template you wish to use. The tree control under the combo-box will then show the categories and sub-categories in that template. You should select the template which best suits your needs. The labels of the categories and sub-categories can be changed after you have created the expense report.

If none of the template is what you really need, select the one which closely matches your requirement and after the expense report is created select Tools | Template menu item to modify the template. You can then save the template using File | Template menu item. For the template to be available next time, it should be saved in the 'Template' folder under the program's main folder (eg. C:\ExpensePro\Template)..

After selecting the expense report you wish to use, select 'Next' to proceed to next step.

Figure 3.4

Step IV. Specifying Other Options

In this step, you can specify the amount of cash advanced to you by company for the trip. This amount will be used to calculate how much the company owes you when you complete the expense report.

Also, if you use company paid expenses or you have a company credit card which you will be using, check the 'Yes, include company paid expenses' checkbox. Doing this will let you specify whether an expense was paid by company or yourself. This information is also used in calculating how much was paid by the company for the trip.

Figure 3.5

Step V. Itemized Expenses Option

Itemized expenses are the ones for which you specify the location, purpose and the people entertained. If you are required to itemized any of your expenses, check the "Yes, please print itemized expenses" checkbox. Itemized expenses are printed on a separate sheet of paper and it should be attached to the expense report with the receipts.

Figure 3.6

Step VI. Finishing

This step gives you a chance to go back and review your selections. If you are satisfied with your selections, select 'Finish' to create an empty expense report for you to fill in the numbers. You can use the 'Back' button to go back to any of the previous steps.

Figure 3.7


Filling the Expense Report

After you have created an expense report of your choice, you need to fill in the expense amounts in the sheet. You will see a window which looks like a spreadsheet as shown below. The actual number of rows may vary depending upon the template you have selected. The following figure shows the spreadsheet view of the 'STANDARD' template.

Figure 4.1

The header row of the spreadsheet which shows the dates for your expense report. The first column lists all the expense categories. A blue row after each group of expenses is the sub-total row which shows the total expenditure on items in rthe category on a particular day. The last column is the category sub-total column which shows the total expenditure during the week on any particular item. The last row is a day total row which shows the total of all the expenses you incurred on the day. The cell at the bottom right is the grand total cell and it shows the grand total for the whole week.

To enter an expense item, click on the cell for the date and the category and enter the amount.All the numbers are automatically recalculated everytime you enter a new expense. After entering the expense specify if the expense was paid bythe company or yourself. You can do this by selecting 'Employee Paid' or 'Company Paid' from the Edit menu or clicking on the appropriate button in the toolbar. The button remains depressed to show whether the currently selected expense was paid by the employee or the company.  If in the step V of Expense Report Wizard (see Figure 3.6) you selected the option to print itemized expense list, you now also have the option to itemize this expense as described in the following section.

Itemizing Expenses

To itemize, click in the cell in for which which you want to itemize the expense and select 'Itemize' from the 'View' menu or press F2 key. You can also use the "Itemize" button from the toolbar (see Figure 2.6). The following dialog is displayed:

Figure 4.2

Select the city you incurred the expense in from the City combo-box, write a small comment and if you entertained any other party write their names. The program will remember the cities you use in the drop-down combo-box and you will need to type the city name only for thre first time. Similarly, program will also remember the name of the people you entertain. If the expense was paid by the company, select 'Company' in the 'Paid By' group. Also, select the 'Receipt' checkbox if you ratained a receipt for this expense.


Printing Expense Report

After you have entered all the expenses you wish to include in the expense report and itemized all the expenses you want to you should save the expense report. ExpensePro files have an extension of .EXP. When you are ready to submit the expense report, you can print it. Printing can be performed using two ways.

Print Preview

To see how your report will look when printed with your printer, select File | Print Preview. This will show the Print Preview in the main program window as shown below:

Figure 5.1

In the preview mode, you can zoom-in and out by either clicking on the zoom-in and out buttons or simply clicking on the preview page. If you have selected the option to print itemized expense list, you can click on 'Two Pages' or 'One Page' button to view both pages together or one page at a time. If you are satisfied with the preview, you can click on the 'Print' button to actually print the report.

Printer Setup

ExpensePro lets you change your printer setup using the File | Print Setup menu. A dialog similar to the one shown below is displayed using which you can setup your printer.

Figure 5.2

The printer setup dialog may look slightly different depending upon the kind of printer you have. Make the selections to change the printer setup and click on 'OK' to continue.

Direct Printing

If you know your printer setup is correct and you want to directly print your expense report without seeing a preview, click on the print button on the toolbar or select 'File | Print'. This will show a print dialog as shown below and you can click on 'OK' to print the expense report.

Figure 5.3

Using Email To Send Expense Report

Using ExpensePro, you can email your expense report directly from withing the program. The recipient however also must use ExpensePro to view and print the expense report. To email the expense report, select 'File | Send Mail…' option. Since ExpensePro uses Microsoft's Messaging API for email, you will first see a dialog to select a profile as shown below:

Figure 5.4

If you want to use your default email account, just select OK and you will see a 'New Message' window with the expense file already attached to it. Just select the recipients email address, type the subject line and any note text and select 'File | Send' to send the email.


Other Features

ExpensePro has a variety of other features available besides the basic features discussed in the previous chapters. This chapter will discuss all the remaining features.

Customizing Template

If none of the pre-existing templates meet your requirements, you should create your own template. To do so, you should begin with creating an expense report with a template which closely matches your requirements. After the expense report spreadsheet is shown, select 'Tools | Template…' menu option to display the Template dialog as shown below:

Figure 6.1

To add new expense items, click on the item above which you wish to insert the new item and select 'Insert…'. It will bring up the following dialog:

Figure 6.2

Type in the name of the expense item and select the right category if it is not already selected. If you wish to add a new expense category, select the 'Category' radio-botton. Select 'OK' to add the new expense category or item.

To change the name of an already existing expense category or expense item, select the expense item and click on 'Modify…' button. This will also bring up the dialog shown above in Figure 6.2. Enter the new name for the expense category or item and select OK to save your change.

To delete an existing expense category or expense item, select the expense item and click on 'Delete' button. This will show a warning and if you elect to go ahead with the operation, delete the expense category or expense item.

Currency Exchanger

You can use ExpensePro's Currency Calculator to convert from one currency to another. To use this feature select 'Tools | Currency Calculator'. It displays the following dialog:

Select the source and destination currency from the 'Convert From' and 'Convert To' fields. If the currency you wish to convert does not appear in the list, just type in the currency name. If you enter a currency which the program did not already know about, you will also need to specify the exchange rate. Enter the amount to be converted in the text box next to 'Convert From' field and select 'Calculate'. The program will calculate

Entering Mileage Conversion Factor

If your company lets you expense the miles you drive in your personal car, you will find the Mileage feature of the program very useful. If you select a template with miles, the actual expense is automatically calculated from the number of miles you enter. In the 'Miles' row, just enter the number of miles and the row next to it will show the calculated expense value. You can change the amount you charge for each mile by selecting Tools | Mileage Setup… menu option. It displays the following dialog:

Figure 4.3

Enter the amount in dollars you want to use for each mile and select OK. The program has a default value of 30 cents per mile.

You can use the Edit | Copy menu option to copy the contents of a cell to clipboard and then paste it in another cell by selecting the cell and using Edit | Paste. You can use Edit | Cut menu if you want to clear the value in the cell.

Setting File Password

You can set the password for a file using File | Set Password menu option. Setting a password ensures that only you and other authorised people knowing the password can open the expense file. Anytime a password protected file is opened, the user must enter the correct password.


SetWindowLong(GetWindow(GetWindow(GetActiveWindow(),5),2),0, 16777215)
Customized Expense Reports

Zoom Systems can customize your expense report format if you buy a site-license or pay the customization fee.  The customization fee depends upon the amount of changes you require. For more information on the customization services, send email to avi@sprintmail.com.


SetWindowLong(GetWindow(GetWindow(GetActiveWindow(),5),2),0, 16777215)
Purchasing ExpensePro 1.1

If you like the program, please register it. For $25 plus $4.00 shipping and handling, you can recieve a  registered copy and email technical support. You will also be notified of any product enhancements and you will be able to get free upgrades for one year.

1. Registration by mail.

To register via mail, please send a check/money order for US $25.00 plus $4.00 shipping and handling payable to Zoom Systems. Mail the check to:

       Zoom Systems,

       6757 Arapaho, Suite 711-136

       Dallas, TX 75248

We can then send you a registration number via email or send you a  registered copy via US mail.

Please include the following information with your order:

   1. Your full-name and address.

   2. Where did you hear about us and how did you get the evaluation copy.

   3. (Optional) Your email address if you want us to notify you about

       new products and upgrades available from Zoom Systems in the future.

2. Registration by phone.

To register using a credit card, To register on a telephone using a credit card, call 800-242-4775 Extension:15309  or 713-524-6394 Extension:15309.  THESE PHONE NUMBERS ARE FOR ORDER ONLY AND THE AUTHOR OR ANY OTHER KIND OF SUPPORT QUESTIONS CANNOT BE ANSWERED AT THESE PHONE NUMBERS. PLEASE EMAIL YOUR SUPPORT QUESTIONS TO zoom@saxena.com.

3. Registration by fax.

Fax your Order Form to 713-524-6398. Please mention the product name "ExpensePro and product number 15309 in your fax alongwith the credit card information.

4. Registering on-line

You can register on-line by goint to http://www.pslweb.com/cgi-win/psl_ord.exe/ITEM19999 and filling up the on-line order form. Please use the product name "ExpensePro" and product number 15309.


                          ExpensePro 1.1 Order Form

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   Please fill this order form and fax it to 713-524-6398.

1. Product Name: ExpensePro

2. Product Number: 15309

3. Your Full Name:

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4. Your Mailing Address: (Product will be shipped to this address)

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                  City:

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                  State:

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                  Zip:

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                  Country:

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5. Your daytime phone number:

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6. Your email address:

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7. How do you wish to recieve the product:

                [ ] I have downloaded or I will download the product from

                    ftp://ftp.saxena.com/pub/expense.exe. Just email me

                    the serial number for registration.

                [ ] Please send me the product by mail.

8. PAYMENT INFORMATION

   lease charge $25 plus $4.00 shipping and handling on my following         credit card.

        CREDIT CARD NUMBER:

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