converting invoice to MS Word?

[oneleft]

Is there a way to get an invoice into Word without a screen capture (on a PC)? Emailing invoices seems to be a growing request and I can't find any way to do this.

Thanks,

R

[LiveOak]

Why does MS Word help in emailing an invoice?

Option 1: Use a PDF print driver, such as the one from Adobe, to print the invoice to a pdf file and attach the file to an email, use FM 5's built-in interface to Outlook Express to make this field the body of a message or use a FM email plug-in to send the email directly.

Option 2: Create a single text field and build an invoice as text in the field (in FM). Use FM 5's built-in interface to Outlook Express to make this field the body of a message. Or use a FM email plug-in to send the email directly.

Option 3: Export the fields you need in Merge format and use mail merge to build the invoice in MS Word. Then ? (never understood why MS Word helped you email).

-bd

[oneleft]

hi bd,

thanks for the reply. the vast majority of my clients are international and they all want to send their invoices as ms word documents. this is what they were doing before and they don't want to give it up.

i'm using fm 4 so i'll have to look to see if what you suggest is possible from it.

thanks,

r

[LiveOak]

I would never send and invoice or contract to a client in an editable format! For what you describe, pdf format is ideal. They can print a copy from any machine. All they need to print an invoice is Acrobat Reader, which is free via the internet. -bd

[oneleft]

Thanks bd. As I said, these are my clients and they have been requesting this for awhile now. I'm certainly not going to tell them no, or to switch to pdf or any other thing since this is how they did it before they had a database and it's how they want to do it now. Thanks again,

R

[oneleft]

ok, guys. I'm not sending anybody an invoice. they've bought my software and THEY want the ability to send THEIR invoices in a word processor. this is THEIR call, not mine. and they've been sending word documents FOREVER. it's a common thing in their industry and it's been an issue for awhile, so if i can make them happy and that's what THEY want, then i'm going to give it to them. they have to live with it, not me.

thanks again for the input.

[oneleft]

oh, and i've figured out a way that they can send thier invoice in a word document and it's not editable, so problem solved.

again, thanks much.

[Kurt Knippel]

quote:

---

Originally posted by oneleft:

Thanks bd. As I said, these are my clients and they have been requesting this for awhile now. I'm certainly not going to tell them no, or to switch to pdf or any other thing since this is how they did it before they had a database and it's how they want to do it now. Thanks again,

R

---

Boy I gotta agree with LiveOak here. Sending them an editable document as YOUR invoice is a recipe for disaster.

You are the vendor, why should the client dictate the form of your invoice? Especially in such as volatile format as a Word document.

This is pure crazy!

------------------

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Kurt Knippel

Consultant

Database Resources

mailto:[email protected]

http://www.database-resources.com

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

[john.daly]

I tried ot post this one yesterday but the server was down. Dn't know whether it could be any help still.

Have a look at my reply in the Filemakeer 5 Forum

http://www.fmforums.com/ubb/Forum26/HTML/001020.html

Basically you can copy the page (invoice) in preview mode and then paste it into a blank Word document and attache this to the email as you have done in the past. Of course it is a picture and is slightly more difficult for someone to alter than a Word document based on text.

[oneleft]

thanks john, that's exactly what i figured out. doing it in preview was, of course, the key.

thanks again,

r