EGIA Contractor University Recommended Department Setup

Introduction

The Department List is used to manage the various profit centers in your business.  “Residential Service” and “Commercial Installation” are two examples of common departments.

Departments are an extremely powerful feature of Total Office Manager because an income statement can be generated for a single department.  This allows managers and owners to see what areas of business are making money and what areas are not.  Departments can also be used on the Transaction Detail by Account report, and certain others.  Departmentalization allows for a better understanding of how different profit centers contribute to the over profit or loss in a company.

EGIA Contractor University® Recommended Department Setup

This is an example department setup for an HVAC company that also performs electrical and plumbing work. This setup is what is recommend by EGIA Contractor University and  Aptora. The “Alias” is a string assigned to the department name. It must be unique. Names can be duplicated but the alias cannot. The alias can be any value that you wish.

Other service industries like computer repair, pool service, lawn maintenance, and so on will have departments that vary depending on their particular profit centers.

Tips

• Divisions, departments, and profit centers are often used interchangeably. The division is usually the top level, followed by departments and profit centers. Our help topics typically use the word “department” to refer to all of these possibilities.
• A department can be made inactive from within its form by Checking the inactive checkbox. You can reactivate it at any time and no information will be lost.
• Total Office Manager is very departmentalized. Every transaction offers the ability to select a department. Transactions that have multiple line items (such as a bill or invoice) offer the ability to select a department for all rows or select a different department per row. Income statements can be printed by the department and even include complete overhead allocation by the department.
• James R. Leichter, the president of Aptora, is a founding faculty member and instructor for EGIA Contractor University. EGIA has built an extensive library of best practices for the HVAC, plumbing, and electrical industry. Aptora is working hard to incorporate those best practices into its software and training resources.