Version 2.13.0 was successfully deployed on Monday night December 14th.
1. New Features.
1.1 Critical Data XML File and the ability to automatically transfer to an FTP platform. It is now possible to obtain an XML file of critical data held on the LetMC software. This includes information relating to landlords, tenants, property, opening balances for accounts and other similar data. This file can be used as a basic back-up or to transfer data to other systems such as a central CRM system. The information held in this file is not sufficient to fully reinstate a new copy of LetMC back to the original version (i.e. it’s not a full back up solution). The file can however, be re-imported into the LetMC software to ‘start again’ on the system. The file can be made available in the Report section and can be automatically transferred to an ftp platform each night.
Read more about the Critical Data XML File....
1.2 Ability to upload properties to rent details to new internet advertising portals. Properties to rent details can now be uploaded to new internet portals on a per company basis and LetMC can also quickly establish a feed to new internet portals. This allows uploaders that are not widely used to be set up quickly and securely. Standard file formats are available (Rightmove V3, Globrix etc.) and secure encryption is also available. This new functionality is also used to transfer data files such as the
Marketing>Mail Merge>All People List and the
Critical Data XML File to FTP platforms.
Read more about the Uploaders for Individual Companies...
2. Minor Improvements.
2.1 ‘Retired - PDQ’ account can be set to appear on Reconcile System to Bank report. The Retired – PDQ company control account can now be set to appear on the
Reports>Reconciliation Reports>Reconcile System to Bank report. This is controlled by a tickbox for ‘Include Retired PDQ Account in Reconcile System to Bank Report’ which is found in
Control Panel>Company Settings>Modify Company Details under the Accounting tab. By default, the tickbox is set to true (ticked) so that the Retired – PDQ account does appear. The Retired – PDQ account can be hidden from the report by unticking the tickbox (only users of System Administrator level have access to the Company Details settings so please contact LetMC Client Support if you require this tickbox to be changed).
When the Retired – PDQ control account is set to appear in the Reconcile System to Bank report the balance amount will be included in the Total Control Account Balances , conversely when the Retired - PDQ is set to remain hidden its balance is not included in the total balance.
2.2 'Studio' Property Type selector improved. New and existing properties can now be modified to have a property type of ‘Studio’. When 'Studio' is selected (in the Property Details step in
Lettings>Property>Properties>Add a Property or
Modify a Property ) although the minimum permitted number of beds is still 1 bed (not 0 beds), the property will appear in the Rightmove search results when 'Flats / Apartments' is selected as the Property Type and 'Number of bedrooms' is set to 'Studio' (effectively 0 bedrooms).
On LetMC, in the
Marketing>Applicants>Modify Applicant Card or
Create Applicant Card, the Matching Property results for Applicants that have selected properties with a minimum bed number of 1 (0 beds is not a valid search criteria and will not be accepted) will include properties with 'Studio' set as property type.
2.3 All Active Tenancies export report has been expanded to include a Management Fees column. The download report for
Reports>Tenancy Reports>All Active Tenancies has been expanded to include the following columns:
Property Type i.e. House
Furnished Status
Min Beds
Max Beds
Advertised as Room in Property (Yes/No)
Management Fees
Guaranteed Rent Fees
Actual Rent
Rent Frequency
Gas Safety Certificate Due Date
EPC Certificate Due Date
2.4 New columns added to Utility Meter Readings report and Vacant Properties report (for Spark). A new drop-down selector for ‘End Date Month’ has been added to the ‘Filter Tenancies’ selector options for the Utility Meter Readings report (in
Reports>Lettings Reports ) which allows tenancies ending to be grouped together more easily. The download report now also identifies the Head Tenant for each property and includes four new columns:
Property Type (e.g. House)
Max Beds
Tenancy Service Type
Let Type (e.g. Re-let, Renewal etc.)
The Vacant Tenancies report (in
Reports>Lettings Reports ) has also been improved to include more information on each property and start dates for future tenancies. New columns include:
Property Type (e.g. House)
Number of Beds (i.e. max beds on the last tenancy)
Next tenancy start date (blank if none)
Next Tenancy Service Type (e.g. Managed)
Next Tenancy Status (e.g. Signed)
Next Tenancy Let Type (e.g. Re-let)
Closing Gas Meter Reading (from previous tenancy)
Closing Water Meter Reading (from previous tenancy)
Closing Electric 1
Closing Electric 2
Closing Electric 3
Closing Electric 4
Closing Electric 5
2.5 New columns added to Landlord Floats Held and Tenant Bond Held reports. A new column which shows the Last Debit Date (last debit made on float and bond account respectively) has been added to the
Reports>Accounts Reports>Tenant Bond Held and
Landlord Floats Held reports. If no debit has been made from a landlord float or tenant bond account then date will be null.
Additionally, three new columns have been added to the Tenant Bond Held report for Tenant Reference, Tenancy Reference and Landlord Reference. These new columns will be particularly useful to letting agents for identifying and removing tenancies that they are not holding deposits for and no longer wish to have registered with the TDS (*from January 2010 the TDS will be levying a charge to Letting Agents on a per tenancy registered basis).
2.6 Client information Infobox for LetMC tips and additional services. A new panel has been added to the Home page which provides letting agents with useful tips for getting the most out of LetMC and also informs of new tools added to LetMC.
Guidance to LetMC on setting up..
2.7 Branch Marketing Name can now override the Company Marketing Name. The company marketing name can now be overridden by a branch specific Marketing Name, this will be particularly useful for companies that operate franchise branches. The company marketing name override is set in the ‘Company Overrides’ section of
Control Panel>Branches>Modify a Branch. When a branch specific Marketing Name has been set it can be used to override the Company Marketing Name in marketing and administrative correspondence including: Tenancy Agreement, Properties to Rent lists, SAS letters, NRL6 Certificates, Contractor worksheets, Utility letters, rent chase methods, SMS, marketing letters, landlord letters etc. For the override to apply will usually require a change to print jobs so please contact LetMC Client Support if this functionality is required. Note: Company Marketing Name will still be used for all branches that do not have a Branch Marketing Name override specified.
2.8 Property ‘Let Status’ column added to View Diary Appointment. When property viewing appointments are viewed in
Office>Diary>View Diary drill-in a ‘Let Status’ column now appears in the Linked Properties table adjacent to the 'Arrange Access' button. The Let Status shows the most recent Instruction status (i.e. Advertised, Let Agreed, Signed) on the property. If the let status of the property changes, prior to the appointment, the Let Status field is updated. The Let Status will allow letting agents to see if a property is still available for let, prior to an appointment, without having to look at Modify Instruction.
2.9 Arrange Access for Diary appointment has been changed from ‘Add’ to ‘Go’. The button which is used to Arrange Access for a property (for a viewing appointment or other property inspection) has been changed from ‘Add’ to ‘Go’.
2.10 Advertise as Student Property tickbox added to Landlord Instruction. A new tickbox for ‘Advertise as Student Property’ has been added to the 'Term Details' in
Lettings>Instructions and Tenancies>Modify a Landlord Instruction , this allows the letting agent to set a property to be advertised on Rightmove as a student property. Ticking the 'Advertise as Student Property' tickbox does not effect the 'Acceptable Tenants' allowable for a property (all tenant types are still acceptable).
A tickbox has also been added to the
Marketing>Printing>Properties to Rent List called [] Only Student Property which allows the letting agent to only include properties that have 'Advertise as Student Property' ticked in their properties to rent list.
2.11 Maximum length for Lloyds Bank Statement Narrative field increased to 255 char to accommodate FPC Ref. The STO reference field length for uploaded Bank Statement entries has been increased from 50 characters to 255. This is to allow enough space to contain the narrative for each statement entry on the Lloyds Bank statement uploads which has increased following the introduction of the Faster Payments System that uses a unique reference code for each Standing Order.
2.12 New HSBC International Business accounts Bank Type added. It is now possible to upload bank statement entries which are in the HSBC International Business account format.
2.13 Make a Landlord Maintenance Deduction warning message improved. Warning message that appears when the amount deducted in
Maintenance>Make a Landlord Maintenance Deduction exceeds the landlord's funds has been made more user friendly. The message now reads “The landlord
landlord name does not have sufficient funds”.
3. Defects Fixed.
3.1 Export reports no longer show data from All Counties when only staff member county should be available. Multi-County and Multi-Branch restrictions (set in
Control Panel>Administration>Security Config ) which are used to determine whether users were able to access reports for branches and counties other than their own have now been applied to the Export reports for the following reports:
Reports>Tenancy Reports>All Active Tenancies Reports>Tenancy Reports>TDS Upload File Reports>Sales Reports>Sales Activity Overview Reports>Lettings Reports>Landlord Management Fees % The remainder outstanding reports will be updated in a future release.
3.2 Un-invoiced Sales export report displayed duplicate data. Landlord Name and Balance which appeared in an incorrect format for some landlords listed in
Reports>Accounts Reports>Un-invoiced Sales report has been fixed. The error was purely format related (data repeating in triplicate) and had no impact on the total Net, VAT and Gross amounts displayed in the Un-invoiced Sales Export report or the Download Report.
3.3 Deposit Management error which came about because a tenant had moved branch has been fixed. An error which occurred in the
Lettings>Inventory and Inspections>Deposit Management view when deposit deductions were made for tenants who had moved branch during their tenancy has been fixed. Deposit deductions are now made on to a person regardless of the branch they are in.
3.4 Quarter summary amounts no longer exclude amounts deducted/ refunded to landlords in NRL Annual Return. The quarter summary amounts that appear in the
Accounting>Tax Reports>NRL Annual Return report now exclude transactions of type Online Payment/ Cheque Payment/ BACS Payment. This ensures that the balance of amounts deducted and refunded (the drawdown amounts) to landlords are included in the summary for each quarter.
3.5 Branch specific Trading Statement has been fixed to appear on custom print jobs. Branch specific Trading Statements now appear correctly in custom print jobs. To set up a Trading Statement add ‘Branch Specific Trading Statement’ in
Control Panel>Branch>Modify a Branch and contact LetMC Client Support to make the necessary changes to print jobs that will incorporate the statement.
3.6 Maximum of 31 bank accounts can be set up for each company. The number of Bank accounts which can be added to
Accounting>Bank Reconciliation>Manage Bank Accounts for each company has been limited to 31. If the maximum number of accounts is exceeded a warning message appears informing the user that no more accounts can be added.
3.7 Annual rent schedule error has been fixed. A defect which caused an error to occur when the Payment Schedule in a Let Agreed tenancy agreement was set to Yearly Payment has been fixed.
3.8 Cancelled Let Agreed tenancies no longer appear in Tenancies Ended report. Tenancies that have been cancelled whilst in the Let Agreed stage (therefore no tenancy was started) no longer appear in the
Reports>Tenancy Reports>Tenancies Ended report.
3.9 Reference to Prospects removed from Manage Areas. A reference to 'Propects' which appeared in
Lettings>Property>Manage Areas has been amended to ‘Applicants’ (the same terminology that is used elsewhere in the system).
3.10 Capitalisation corrected and question mark added to cancel payment references message. The pop-up message which appears when a Payment Reference is cancelled in
Accounting>Bank Reconciliation>Manage All Payment References now reads “Are you sure you want to cancel the selected payment reference?”.
4. System Improvements.
4.1 Letter Manager Address moved from database into the application.config. The Letter Manager Address has been moved out of the system database and into the application.config to improve software release procedures.
Read about other past releases..
Read about planned future updates..