March 2023

Reminders and early spring specials

Our offices will be closed on Good Friday, April 7.  

Here are our early spring specials, effective from now through April 30, 2023:  

Because it continues to be much needed, we are offering a 20% discount on the upgrade from DQB Starter to Standard coupled with the DQB Images/Digital Files supplement.  This brings the one-time license fee of $700 down to $560 USD.  

For those already licensed for DQB Standard or Online, the 20% discount can be applied to DQB Images/Digital Files, bringing the $500 license fee down to $400 USD.  

Also because it is highly useful and very much needed for safeguarding your information, we ae offering a 20% discount on the Advanced Backup Protocol, bring the $200 fee down to $160 USD.  

Let us know if you would like more details on any of these.

For those offering the Lab Lookup web portal 

For those labs that offer the Lab Lookup service to their customers, we want to let you know that we have implemented new measures to add speed to the case search.  This can be particularly useful when a wide date range is selected and/or a large volume of cases is involved. If you are already using Lab Lookup, you can request a special update.  

Included as part of your DQB service agreements, this ongoing service provides a convenient way for your customers to lookup both their current and history cases and to communicate with you.  It has a special feature that provides for doing this in one session for all the doctors in a group practice.  The user can select specific date ranges, doctor and patient.  

Let us know if you would like to schedule a time to implement this for your lab.  You can also request a copy of the guides for the lab and the customer to review the options, settings and reports.  You can request customization of the reports.

An overview of QuickBooks online vs desktop

As longtime Intuit developers we were recently given insights into the status and plans for both the online and desktop versions of QuickBooks.  As we develop software for both DentaLab and custom systems that can synchronize with all the QuickBoooks versions, we also develop our own critiques and preferences. 

QB Online (QBOE and QBOA):

For QB Online, the greatest success has been with very small businesses, those having 20 or fewer employees, who do not need job costing, inventory or customization.  For this marketplace, Intuit has gradually been adding more internet financial services such as payment processing and banking services such as checking, saving and loan accounts.   The challenges have been, as they are for all web-based operations, on the issues of security, service interruptions and price competition.  

The more capable versions such as Advanced (QBOA) have had to share the marketplace with other competitors.    When it comes to synchronization for custom applications, however, it is the Advanced version that we like the best.  Whenever a lab is OK with the QBOA monthly fee, this is the one we recommend for use with DentaLab to provide for tracking inventory and for transferring case fields to QB custom fields for invoices and reports. 

QB Desktop (QBDT):

The QB desktop versions (Pro, Premier and Enterprise) emerged from Quicken, Intuit's original flagship product for personal finances, in the 1990's.   They have had a steady beat of enhancements and new capabilities as well as a strong reputation for reliability and accuracy.  At this time, the Pro version is no longer being sold, but those already licensed can continue to renew their annual subscriptions.  Intuit has been recruiting QuickBooks Solutions Providers (including Mainstreet) to provide more hands-on support for the Premier and Enterprise versions.  Intuit has included substantial marketing and technical support and the ability to sell subscriptions for these versions.

Of the three levels, we as software developers like the Enterprise version best because it is SQL based, which provides for greater reliability and volumes of data as well as coordination with many other software systems.   It also provides for more advanced inventory and costing as well as more custom fields for industry-specific needs.     With the desktop versions, you have a choice of keeping and controlling your information in-house with remote access choices such as AnyDesk or placing it on one of the many highly secure web-based services available such as Amazon Web Services.   

Because of the necessity to keep up with ever increasing internet security measures, Intuit like many of the other leaders in the computer industry has been promoting combining licensing with ongoing updates through subscriptions.  Particularly for those aspects of our software service that require patient privacy and high levels of security such as the DentalRx web portal and the Advanced Backup Protocol, we have recognized the need for ongoing service agreements and staying up-to-date.  

We have also developed measures to provide for an easy transition for those who want to switch DQB from the desktop to synchronize with an online version of QuickBooks.

To answer your questions....

Q:  Can we receive an email every time a case is sent to our lab via DentalRx ? 

A: When the number of cases is very small, this could be a viable concept but would not work as the volume increases.   There are several options within DQB that you can use to pinpoint the DentalRx cases:  

• From the Cases menu, select New DentalRx cases.   
• From the Case Reports menu, select Cases by Date and Status, then click the indicator for Show DentalRx Cases Only. You will be able to view, print or save to one of the industry-standard formats.
  
• From the Case List, enter DRX in the Entry By field and click On Hold in the status column to generate a list of new cases received via DentalRx that have not yet been scheduled.  If you wish, you can also enter other criteria such as dates and status for your specific purpose.  In addition to displaying the search results, the Case List will also give you a count and the option to export to Excel.

Q:  Can you add a feature so that I can have reminders for myself in DQB? 

A:  You can use features already in DQB by adding a customer that would be either yourself or any other name you wish to use.  Then you can enter alerts with dates, activity logs, emails and/or any of the other customer options with easy access from the Customer List or the Customer Center. 

Q:  We receive a lot of calls from the dental offices with questions about their cases.  Do you have any recommendations for the most efficient way to handle these? 

A:  When you are working at your computer to manage your cases and must also respond to customer calls, one of the handiest things to do is set up dual monitors.  You can have one dedicated to your task at hand such as entering cases, creating invoices, or tracking workflow and then another dedicated to the case list or the customer center.    There is no need to interrupt your work and then navigate to another option to respond to your customer.  If the call results in changes to the case record, you can enter these as well.  

Most modern desktop computers can support a second monitor.   On the back if you see another port next to the current port used for your monitor, you will be able to connect another one. Laptops typically include a video output port such as HDMI, USB-C or Display Port.  From the Display section of the Windows Control Panel, you can review and select the options you have available.  Then when working on one of the monitors, simply move your mouse to the edge toward the other monitor.  Call or email us if you need coaching on this.  

Another option worth trying is to offer the Lab Lookup service so that dental office staff can check on the status of their cases.   You can select which case fields you want to provide and/or customize the report.  This service provides answers to the most frequent questions on whether the case has been received and when they can expect to have it completed and delivered.  They can also send a message via email.

If you want to use the email services in DQB and QuickBooks

For both DQB and QuickBooks, you will need to have a valid email address in the customer's QuickBooks record.  This will be synchronized into DQB.

For DQB:

You can choose your email service and then setup the technical details for this in DQB Options/Email Settings.  Typically, these include a specific port and link for its server as well as a login and password.   We can provide assistance with this.   You can choose to have an email associated with a customer or with a case as well as the messages to accompany the emails.  

Another level of email capability is through the DQB Notifications supplement that can be added to the DQB standard version.  This provides for automatically sending reports via email to your customers on their cases received and recently shipped.  You can choose the frequency and schedule for sending and which customers are to receive their reports.

Another feature of the Notifications supplement provides for automatically sending internal lab reports to selected personnel on the schedule you choose.  Already adapted for formats compatible with email protocols are a number of reports such as work in progress. These reports can be viewed on any device including smartphones and do not require access to a computer.  You can also request customization of your notification reports. 

For QuickBooks:

Intuit provides its own email service and includes the settings needed for this.   You will also need to have an up-to-date subscription to either an online or desktop version of QuickBooks.  

For the desktop versions, you will need to specify in Edit Preferences/Send Forms how you wish to use email. To send invoices and statements via email, go to File/Send Forms to enter your selections. 

For both the desktop and online versions, you can specify the preferred send method for each customer and whether it is now or later.

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