Quite often we have clients ask us to create a new company in Dynamics GP that has the same master data as an existing company. Many businesses will do this because:
- The company was purchased and the new owners will start a new company with the same master data but no transactions as of the purchase date.
- Or, there is a new subsidiary company that has the same master data (or at a minimum the same chart of accounts).
This is a fairly easy process when you have the Professional Services Tools Library (PSTL) installed, but there are some things that you should consider.
PSTL Instructions
The first step is to use the Dynamics GP Utilities to create the new company. During the company create process you can choose to copy security from an existing company. This is a great feature because it will copy the User Access and User Security from the existing company to the new company so that you do not need to set up security for the new company.
After the company has been created, open Dynamics GP and sign in as SA and select the new company.
If you have any third party products be sure to follow any prompts or steps to add in the third party products to the new company. An example is for Mekorma MICR. When you sign into the new company as SA, the Mekorma updater will launch to inform you that you need to update the company. Be sure to click Process on this so that the Mekorma tables are installed in the new company.
After the third party product maintenance has completed, open the Professional Services Tools. The first time you open PSTL, it will build the Professional Services Tools tables in the new company, so it will take a few minutes to open and you will see a progress bar as the tables are built.
When the Professional Services Tools Library opens, click the radio button next to Company Copy and then click the Next button. Type in the Source Company and the Destination Company database IDs. Do not lookup these – in some versions of GP there are errors when you use the Lookup button on these fields. Check the boxes related to the modules you want to copy. You must copy the Financial. If you are using Management Reporter (MR), be sure to also copy Multicurrency. Then click the Process button.
Next, you will receive a message indicating that all tables in the Destination Company will be deleted. Click the Continue button.
After the process is completed, you will see a message at the bottom of the Company Copy window and you can close out of the window and out of the Professional Services Tools window.
Preparing the New Company
Now, we need to do a little clean up in the new company.
Fiscal Periods: When you copy the company information, all fiscal years and periods for the source company are copied to the new company.
You can run the following SQL scripts to remove all of the fiscal periods.
delete SY40100 delete SY40101
Then go into the Fiscal Period Setup window and add the year(s) that apply to the new company. Administration area page > Setup section > Company section > Fiscal Periods. Enter the Year, the First Day, Last Day, and the Number Of Periods and click the Calculate button. Then click OK.
Customers: If you copy the Sales module, the customer master information will be copied, but the Customer Summary table will not copy. To correct this, use Check Links on the Receivables Customer Master Files.
Microsoft Dynamics GP button > Maintenance > Check Links. Select Sales as the Series, then highlight the Receivables Customer Master Files in the left pane and Insert into the Selected Tables. Then click OK. This will create the Customer Summary record for each customer.
Items: If you copy the Inventory module, it will copy the items and item site information, but all of the quantities related to the Item Sites will be copied. To correct some of this, you can run the Item Reconcile on all items. This will correct Quantity On Hand and Quantity Allocated.
Inventory area page > Utilities section > Reconcile. If you have a lot of items, this process may take some time to complete.
After the reconcile has completed, there are additional fields in the Item Site table (IV00102) that may need to be set to zero using SQL scripts.
Quick Journals: When you copy the Financial module, the Quick Journals will be copied. You may want to delete these.
Budgets: When you copy the Financial module, the Budgets will be copied. You may want to delete these.
Set the functional currency for the new company (Financial area page > Setup Section > Multicurrency). Usually the window is completed, but you may need to open it and click the OK button.
Now you are ready to use your new company! Here’s a printable PDF of these step-by-step instructions on how to add a new company using master data from an existing one. If you have questions or need some assistance, visit our support page for more help.
