Producing Documents

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Just a reminder that letter, email, fax or SMS messages are all termed documents.

This topic is learn by doing.  It is intended to give an basic insight into the way documents are produced on a day to day basis.  Carry out the instructions in this topic on your computer to achieve the stated objective.  Subsequent topics build on this information.

You may like to make use of the Training module if not \keep track of where you save documents as you will probably want to delete them.


Simple one-off document
Objective
To create and produce a simple document to a landlord.

Go to Setup menu > Preferences > Spell Check Options tab.  Make sure there is a tick in the British dictionary.

On each of the landlords, tenants and suppliers main screens you will find a [Mail] button which is the starting point to send any document to a single recipient.

Go to the Landlords main screen and choose any landlord.
Press [Mail] and a popup menu will appear which will:-
always display New Letter plus possibly Email and / or TXT message, all as one choice
and New Fax as another choice
Select the New Letter ... option

The document selection / entry screen is next to appear.  It has a header section containing various boxes, most of which we will ignore for the moment, and a large white empty space where the body of the document we want to create will be assembled.

In the header untick both Use Letterhead and Live Spell Check
Now click in the body area and enter a proper sentence or two, not rubbish.

Please make at least one deliberate spelling error and when you have completed your document press [Spell Check]
The spell check should stop on the error and open a window offering a number of options.
You can probably work out what to do but for detailed use of the Spell Check go to the Word Processing Features topic.

Press [Print] when you have corrected the error(s) and completed your document.
Press Print] again on the Report Destination screen to display the document in the (Ace Viewer) print preview screen.

If you wish to actually print the document click the printer icon at the top left followed by [Print] on the second Report Destination screen after which you will return to the print preview, otherwise continue with the next step.

Press [Close] and you will be back at the document entry screen.
Press [Close] again and a "Save Document to" screen should appear.
Click [Cancel] to return to the main Landlords screen.
If the Save Letter to screen failed to appear you will be returned to the main Landlords screen.  Exactly what happens depends upon how the document saving preferences are set as described in the Saving Documents topic.

You have just created, checked the spelling and printed a very simple one-off letter.  Wasn't that hard!!

Repeat the exercise again but this time  when you are on the letter selection / entry screen place a tick against Live Spell Check and see what happens when you make a spelling error.

If you find red wavy lines appearing under all the words you enter it means either the dictionaries are not set correctly or your spelling is really rubbish.
So click [Close], answer No to the Save as a Draft message and go to the Word Processing Features topic.  Check the spell check settings then return here and try again.

If you find red wavy lines appearing under just some of the words you enter they may not be in the dictionary or have incorrect spelling.

Also try a putting a tick in the Use Letterhead check box and print the letter at least to the print preview window.  It is possible that you may see no difference with the print preview or actual hard copy print.  If this is the case it is because the letterheads have not been set up which is covered in the Creating Letterheads topic next.

See what happens when the cursor is placed on any word.  Look at the status bar.

Use some of the formatting features available by right mouse clicking in the body pane.  See the Word Processing Features topic.

At this stage you have created an ad hoc or one-off document which is being sent to one recipient, in this case a letter to a landlord.  You have been introduced to two methods of checking your spelling.  You should know that a document may optionally have a letterhead and perhaps used some of the formatting functions.



Using a Standard Document
Objective
Again we are going to create and produce a letter to a landlord containing words or data which are personalised to the recipient but this time by using a standard document containing the entire text of what we want to say.  This time our keying effort is minimal to virtually non-existent.

Before starting make sure there is still a tick in the British dictionary on the Setup menu > Preferences > Spell Check Options tab.

Go to the Landlords main screen and choose any landlord.
Press [Mail] and select  the New Letter ... option

Because we intend to use a standard document for this letter attention needs to be given to the header boxes we conveniently ignored before.

Use the From list box to select the person who is writing this letter, or more correctly whose name will be at the bottom.  The choices available are taken from the Setup menu > Property Managers table.

Displayed in the To box is the content of the Contact field on the Name and Address Details window / tab of the landlord, (tenant, or supplier) chosen on the main screen.  This name can not be changed in the To box.

Select the date you want to appear on the document.

Now the exciting bit.
Press the drop down arrow at the right end of the Standard Document list box and locate the sample document titled "zL010 Landlord Welcome".
If you can not locate that specific document choose another landlord document.

When selected, the body of the document should appear like magic in the main pane filled in with personalised landlord information such as the name and address, the date of the letter and so on.  At the bottom the sign off will be that of the property manager selected in the header From list box.

Have a play on this letter selection screen by changing the entries in the header section and see the effect on the body of the letter.
At this point only choose landlord standard documents.

When you have finished trying various options re-select the "zL010 Landlord Welcome" standard document and make sure "Use Letterhead" is ticked.

Press [Print] when you have completed your document.
Press [Print] again on the Report Destination screen to display the document in the Ace Viewer print preview screen.

If you wish to actually print the document click the printer icon at the top left followed by [Print] on the second Report Destination screen after which you will return to the print preview, otherwise continue with the next step.

Press [Close] and you will be back at the document entry screen.

This time we want to save this document in the landlord's Correspondence File.
Press [Close] again and a Save Letter to screen should appear.
If the Save Letter to screen fails to appear and you are returned to the main Landlords screen the document saving preferences may need to be changed.
Only make changes to the saving preferences in the Training module or with the permission of the Aspect Property Manager head honcho or supervisor.
To change the saving preferences go to Setup menu > Preferences > Correspondence tab and set the Correspondence File rule for letters to the default.
Then return and repeat the steps above to this point.

When the Save Letter to screen appears place a tick in the Save letters to the Correspondence File checkbox.
Place the radio button selection against Don't save as either Notes or Bringups
Click [OK] and you will be returned to the main Landlords screen.

Now click [Mail] > Correspondence File where you should see the landlord welcome letter just produced in the Index panel.  Accessing documents saved in the Correspondence File is covered later in     XXXX    so for now click [Close]

How easy was that!!

Try repeating the steps again this time changing the Use Letterhead setting and print the document at least to the print preview window to see the effect.

Have Live Spell ticked for the next exercise and make an error or two.  Position the cursor on a blank line just above the "sign-off" section and type a new sentence such as "Congratulations on ...." or "I would like to draw your attention to ..." and print the document again.  Alternatively modify some of the existing text even the data which has been merged into the letter from the database.  This document when sent out and when saved will contain these modifications but the original standard document selected remains unchanged and ready for re-use.