New feature, Plan vs. Actual comparison

Question:

Palo Alto Software introduces Planned vs. Actual comparisons in Business Plan Pro 2006 Premier. Users with the Premier version of Business Plan Pro 2006 can track business performance by monitoring the variance between the financial plan and how the company actually performed.

This feature was added to existing installations of Business Plan Pro 2006 Premier software via the update which was released on 10/13/2005. Any plan created with the Premier software after installing this update (version ## 9.04.0015) can contain the Planned vs. Actual tables.

Plans created with Business Plan Pro 2006 prior to installing the 9.04 update can be converted using a free conversion utility which can be downloaded from our Web site.

Answer:

Take the following steps to download the free conversion utility and use it to convert any pre 9.04 plan files to the new format which includes Planned vs. Actual comparisons:

    Note: Before proceeding, verify that you have downloaded and installed the latest updates for Business Plan Pro 2006 Premier by clicking on the Help drop down menu and choosing About. The version and the core version numbers should be 9.04 / 8.35 (or higher). If you do not have this version (or higher) of the software, you can download it by using the Update Manager which is found in the Tools drop down menu.
    Download the converter and convert the business plan:
  1. Click the link below to download the conversion utility:

    2. Business Plan Conversion Utility
  2. When prompted, choose to save this file to the Desktop of your computer.
  3. Once the download has completed, close any open programs, then double click on the bp2enu_904_conversion.exe file to launch the utility.
  4. Click the Browse button to browse to and select your original Business Plan Pro 2006 plan file then click OK.
  5. Click the Update file button to begin the conversion. When the conversion is complete you will receive a message from the converter with the name and location of the converted plan file.
Once the plan has been successfully converted, you can open it in Business Plan Pro 2006 Premier and begin to use the Planned vs. Actual comparison tables.
    Take the following steps to open the converted plan:
  1. Launch Business Plan Pro 2006 Premier.
  2. On the Start a Plan screen, choose the option to Open an Existing Plan.
  3. Under the Open an Existing Plan section, double click on the More files... option.
  4. Browse to the converted plan (it should have the original plan name with converted.bpd appended to it), select it, and click Open.