Getting Started #
TAD standardizes implementations, eliminating guesswork and ensuring a structured, repeatable process. Your implementation will progress through several key milestones, with TAD playing a crucial role at each step.
Implementation Milestones
- Set Code Format – Ensure consistency in coding structures.
- Load Your Setups – Import and configure setup tables.
- Practice, Practice, Practice – Bring in opening balances and historical data.
- Create Your Live Company – Transfer tested data to the live environment.
- Time to Go Live – Finalize setup and transition to active use.
- Final Audit of Setup – Verify system settings, interfaces, and configurations after go-live.
Each milestone is designed to simplify implementation, reduce errors, and get you up and running efficiently.
Set Code Format #
One of the first—and most critical—decisions in your implementation is the Code Format. This format defines how specific columns will appear in Vista, allowing you to tailor the system to your business needs. Once transactions are posted, the format cannot be changed, so making the right decision from the start is essential.
Key Columns Affected by Code Format
- GL Account
- Contract/Job (Project)
- Phase Code (Cost Code)
- Equipment Number
- Equipment Category
- Equipment Cost Code
- Material Categories
- Phone Number
To determine your formats, you can use the Code Format Generator, which includes examples to help you visualize the final formats before applying them. This allows you to quickly adjust settings as needed and generate accurate values. The generator can produce a CSV file that TAD will use for seamless application into your system, though this step is typically handled by your consultant.
Once your Cloud Server is ready and the Code Format has been applied, TAD can be installed to begin managing your implementation with consistency and accuracy from the start.
With your Code Format applied, you now have the structure in place to begin configuring your setup tables and importing data efficiently.
Load Your Setups #
With your Code Format applied, you can begin configuring your setup tables with your data. A company configuration may include over 250 setup tables, yet more than 85% of these do not have an import template within Vista.
To streamline this process, TAD provides Implementation Setup templates, designed with:
- Required and Commonly Used columns placed at the front for easy access.
- Optimized column order, ensuring records are loaded efficiently.
Additionally, you can leverage TAD’s Converter feature to create custom templates that map your source data columns to Vista’s data structure. During the copy process, you can:
- Strip characters for data consistency.
- Apply cross-references to align with Vista’s requirements.
- Sequence columns for proper ordering.
Since the copy process does not alter your raw data, you can test with small datasets before applying changes on a larger scale, reducing risk and ensuring a smooth implementation.
Practice, Practice, Practice #
“Plans are worthless, but planning is everything.” – Dwight D. Eisenhower
Successful implementation requires hands-on practice in Vista. If you do not adequately rehearse your job responsibilities, you will struggle during go-live and the first six months of operations. To ensure a smooth transition, practice your key tasks and run reports to confirm you can retrieve the data you need.
Key Practice Areas:
- Analyze your WIP data and complete a month-end close.
- Run a full parallel payroll to verify accuracy.
- Enter a new job and parallel test commitments, projections, change orders, billings, and costing.
- Process AP invoices to ensure you can successfully pay vendors.
- Identify 3rd party data needs (e.g., 401(k) providers, benefit providers, positive pay).
Just as practicing daily operations is essential, practicing balance loading is equally critical. If you do not properly test this process, certain aspects of your operations may be non-functional for weeks after go-live. Go-live should not be the first time you are searching for your data.
To support this, TAD offers Implementation Balance templates designed to help you efficiently load and validate your balances before go-live.
Create Your Live Company #
Before copying your Test Company to the Live Company, confirm that your key configurations, security settings, and approval workflows are finalized. This ensures a seamless transition.
A few weeks before go-live, you will copy your Test Company setups into a Live Company. This step ensures that your tested configurations are transferred seamlessly, reducing the risk of manual setup errors.
During this process, you can select which records to include, such as:
- Vendors
- Customers
- Employees
- Equipment
- Contracts
- Jobs
- Phases
- Work Orders
- Agreements
Additionally, the copy process allows you to exclude sample records that come preloaded in the Test Company. This ensures your Live Company starts with clean, accurate data, free from test transactions or placeholders used during setup.
By using TAD’s Company Copy Template, you eliminate redundant manual entry, streamline the transition, and ensure consistency between your Test and Live environments.
Time to Go Live #
At this stage, your Live Company is created, and now it’s time to process your first real transactions.
If you practiced loading balances, you can reuse your existing templates for a smooth data transfer. If not, the Implementation Balance templates and Time to Go Live document will guide you through the process to ensure a successful transition.
What to Do Before Go-Live
✅ Verify Security & User Access
- Ensure all users and roles are properly configured.
- Confirm that users can log in and access the correct modules.
✅ Confirm Setup & Balances
- Run trial balances and reconciliation reports to validate GL, AP, AR, and job cost balances.
- Check that financial statements and key reports pull accurate data.
✅ Perform Final Data Loads (if applicable)
- If additional balance loads are needed, process them now.
- Validate open invoices, payroll accruals, and contract balances.
✅ Run Test Transactions
- Enter test AP invoices, run payroll, and record job costs to ensure everything posts correctly.
- Verify subledger to GL reconciliation before full go-live.
✅ Notify Teams & Establish Support
- Ensure users know when live transactions start.
- Assign key contacts for go-live support and troubleshooting.
By following these final steps, you ensure that your company is fully prepared for operations in Vista from day one.
Final Audit of Setup #
Imagine going live, entering transactions, and then discovering your financial data isn’t flowing correctly—payroll doesn’t hit your GL, invoices don’t reconcile, or job costs don’t appear on financial reports. These issues can lead to major operational disruptions if interfaces are not enabled. This happens when SubLedger Interfaces aren’t properly enabled, causing missing details in financial reports, trial balances, and job costing.
The Final Audit of Setup milestone ensures all system interfaces are active and working before your team relies on Vista for daily operations. With TAD’s Company Param Flags reports, you can quickly confirm:
✅ Audit Flags are tracking changes for accountability and troubleshooting.
✅ Batch Reports are attaching correctly, ensuring users can retrieve, review, and verify batch reports for auditing and reconciliation.
✅ SubLedger Interfaces are enabled, ensuring seamless data flow from AP, AR, Payroll, Job Cost, and Equipment into the General Ledger.
This final validation step protects your financial integrity, preventing costly corrections and hours of troubleshooting after go-live. Skipping this step isn’t an option—your system’s accuracy depends on it.
By following TAD’s structured implementation approach, you’ll launch with confidence, accuracy, and full data visibility from day one.
What’s Next with TAD? #
Implementation is just the beginning. Now that you’re live in Vista, you can focus on optimizing processes, automating workflows, and unlocking new efficiencies with TAD’s advanced features.
Explore the following topics to enhance your efficiency and maximize TAD’s capabilities:
- Reports – Easily extract clean, formatted data from Vista into Excel without the headaches of built-in Crystal Reports or complex SQL queries. Unlike Vista’s standard reporting, TAD Reports allow you to select multiple companies and generate a consolidated report in one step, eliminating the need to run reports separately for each company.
- Financials – Generate essential financial reports with predefined, customizable layouts for the Balance Sheet, Income Statement, Cash Flow, and Trial Balance. These layouts replicate standard financial statement structures, ensuring flexibility and compatibility with Vista.
- Accruals – Simplify cost accruals by downloading cost data directly into JC Cost Adjustments and GL Journal Entries. If your accrual data originates from Vista, the process can be fully automated—TAD can pull and load the necessary data directly into the batch table, eliminating manual entry and reducing errors.
- Automator – Automate the download, email, and saving of reports in PDF, CSV, and XLS formats. You can also schedule actions like Post Batch for automated processing, export multi-sheet workbooks as separate or combined files, and send customized emails via Outlook. The Automator Scheduler integrates with Windows Task Scheduler for full automation.
- Blaster – Enhance Automator by breaking reports into smaller, targeted subsets, isolating unique values for customized distribution. Using Data-Driven and Manual Entry methods, Blaster ensures that each recipient gets only the relevant data, improving efficiency and accuracy in report distribution.
Unlock the full potential of TAD and take control of your Vista implementation!