Extracting your financial data from Sage 50
Step 1: Download your report templates
Follow this link to download your Sage 50 report templates (template folder should download automatically upon clicking the link). Within the downloaded folder, you should see three template files: Sage Earth Bank Payments, Sage Earth Paid Invoices and SageEarth-PNL. The report files in the download are zip files - these will need to be extracted before proceeding to the next step
Step 2: Upload your report templates to Sage 50
Go to Sage 50, select Bank Accounts > Reports and then select any report for which you have an existing template saved (for example, Purchase and bank payments as in the screenshot below). Right click in the right-hand panel and select Show in Explorer.
In File Explorer, click the up arrow (↑) until you see REPORTS; open this folder.
Open the Bank folder, then drag and drop the Sage Earth Bank Payments template file into the My Bank Reports folder within this location.
Repeat this process with your other two report template folders (Open Supplier folder, drag and drop Sage Earth Paid Invoices into My Supplier Reports; Open Nominal folder, drag and drop SageEarth-PNL into My Nominal Reports).
Step 3: Create your spend data batch report
Within Sage 50, go to Tools > Batch Reporting and select Batch reports > New. Enter a name and description (e.g. 'Sage Earth Batch Report').
Under Available Reports, open REPORTS > Bank > My Bank Reports > and select Bank Expenses for Sage Earth; Click Add >. Repeat this process with the paid invoices template only (Supplier > My Supplier Reports > Paid Invoices for Sage Earth > Add >).
The two files should now appear under Selected Reports. Click Save As and enter the file name again > click Save.
Your saved batch report should now appear under Batch reports (you may need to click out and back into the view for it to appear).
Step 4: Download your spend data batch report
Right click on your saved batch report and select Report to Excel.
Note it is important that you select the Report to Excel option NOT the 'Data to Excel' option (choosing 'Data to Excel' will format the data incorrectly and will give an error message further on within the process)
The report should look like this when opened:
A pop-up window titled Criteria Values should now appear (this may take a few moments). The only fields you need to amend here are Date Range. Ensure the dates you select when creating your first batch report cover at least one full financial year (this is your baseline year, from which you'll measure your emissions reduction progress) as well as any periods you wish to include from the current financial year, ensuring the end date is not in the future. We advise uploading data covering complete months only.
Input your date range and click OK.
An Excel file should now automatically open on your screen (check your Downloads folder if file doesn't appear after a few moments), ready to be uploaded to Sage Earth.
This file is your spend data report, we use this to inform our spend-based carbon accounting methodology.
Step 5: Download your profit and loss report
5.1. For periods within the current financial year
In Sage 50, go to Nominal Codes > Reports; Double-click My nominal code reports and right click Profit and Loss for Sage Earth; Select Report to Excel.
Note it is important that you select the Report to Excel option NOT the 'Data to Excel' option (choosing 'Data to Excel' will format the data incorrectly and will give an error message further on within the process)
The report should look like this when opened:
A Criteria Values pop-up window will again appear, check that the date period covers the current financial year only, and that the end date matches that selected for your spend data batch report) and click OK.
An Excel file should automatically open on your screen, this is your profit and loss report, ready to be uploaded to Sage Earth.
This step is optional, but helps to inform your carbon intensity calculation, part of your overall carbon footprint.
5.2. For historic financial years (including your chosen baseline year)
Historic profit and loss data should be stored in your Sage 50 archive (provided you have created one during a year-end process) Follow the steps below to access archived data:
Navigate to File > Open > ‘Company Archive…’.
A window titled ‘Company Archives – [Company name]’ should appear, containing a list of available archives for your selected company.
Select the archive with the date applicable to the year-end you are looking for and select ‘Open’. You may be prompted to log in at this stage, these details should be your normal Sage login credentials (if they existed when the archive was created).
Once the archive has opened, follow the instructions within step 5.1 to run your profit and loss report, checking the selected date range correct.
Once you have produced your profit and loss report, simply navigate to File > Open Company Data to return to the current financial year in Sage 50.
Uploading your financial data to Sage Earth
When connecting to Sage Earth for the first time
Go to app.earth.sage.com/login
When you reach the Connect your data page, click Sage50 upload.
Using the Next button, navigate to Please tell us about your company financials and input your financial year end date. Click Next.
On the Upload your spend data page, click Choose your file and select your spend data report (as extracted from Sage 50 in Step 4 above), Click Open > Upload file and then Continue.
Next, you'll be asked to Upload your profit and loss, repeat the same process detailed in the previous bullet, selecting your profit and loss report (as extracted in Step 5 above). You can choose to Skip this step if you wish (a carbon intensity figure would not be generated in this case).
On the next page, you'll be asked to Please provide us with SIC codes for your business, input your Company name and Industry Classification (SIC code) here. Click Confirm.
When uploading future reports
Go to the User Menu in your Sage Earth dashboard (top-right corner) and select Financial Data Settings > Upload files > Choose your file. Repeat the upload steps detailed in the bullets above.
Please note: While our Sage 50 integration is in its pilot phase, there may be edge cases where users run into issues following the steps outlined in this guide. Should you experience any problems uploading your files, or at any other stage in the process, please drop us an email at [email protected] and the team will be happy to assist.