I’ve just learned that Sage will now sell “kept” Extended Solutions for installation to MAS90/200 at level 4.3 AND EARLIER.

Update March 19, 2009:

Now you see it — now you don’t…

Sage initially told us that they would make their 56 kept solutions available on any supported version of MAS 90 or MAS 200 until the solution was incorporated to the next level of MAS 90/200.

Policy change by Sage.

Long story short — Sage won’t sell any of  the 56 kept Extended Solutions at any version prior to 4.3.

They’re no longer making them available at earlier levels.

The information above supersedes the post that we wrote below based on lengthy conversations with multiple Sage personnel – who ultimately reversed policy on us while we were mid-stream proposing their solution (with information they provided) to a customer.

Update March 29. 2010: We continue to have issues both ordering and obtaining the most basic of pre-sales support on any Sage Extended Solution sales. We recommend that you not purchase any of the 56 kept solutions and instead wait for them to be incorporated into a future version of MAS 90 and MAS 200.

As you probably know, starting with the release of MAS 90/200 v4.4 Sage announced in 2009 that they’d be doing away with their Extended Solutions catalog of what appeared to be 500 or more custom enhancements while keeping 56 of the most popular Extended Solutions for incorporation to versions 4.4+ of Sage MAS90 and 200.

Sage Extended Solutions in many instances replaced the need for custom MAS90 and MAS 200 programming.

Starting with release 4.4 of Sage MAS 90 and MAS 200 Sage  will incorporate  (add into the MAS product) 56 of their most popular enhancements on a two or three year rollout schedule.

Discontinued solutions are being provided under an open source license to Sage Preferred Development Partners (view the list here) who can upgrade them (possibly for a fee) and resell them.

In the interim there was considerable confusion about whether a licensed user of MAS 90 or MAS 200 could purchase any of those “kept” Extended Solutions at a level other than 4.3.

If you view the Sage Extended Solution web site you’ll see the issue is not entirely clear as the site states that the 56 kept Extended Solutions ” can be added to your Sage MAS 90 and 200 4.3 system“.

What about those customers on a version earlier than 4.3 who needed one of the 56 “kept” enhancements?

Until this policy shift they were being told by Sage that they must upgrade to version 4.3 before they could purchase any enhancements.

Before you suggest to me that I’m crazy – and that Sage was selling the 56 kept solutions for any version – read on.

The prior policy of the sales desk appeared to have been that kept Extended Solutions would only be sold at 4.3.

Sage Refused to Sell Extended Solutions at Versions Prior to 4.3

Here’s the email that I’d received as recently as last Thursday telling me that Extended Solutions that Sage was keeping for incorporation wouldn’t (then) be sold at any version other than 4.3.

From: xxxxx
Date: Thu, Feb 18, 2010 at 6:02 PM
Subject: FW: Selling older Extended Solutions to existing customers
To: Wayne Schulz

Hi Wayne

Please see the email below.

xxxx

title

Sage Business Solutions Division
(800)-854-3415 xxx
www.sagenorthamerica.com
Sage. Your business in mind.

From: xxxx
Sent: Thursday, February 18, 2010 2:59 PM
To: yyyyy
Subject: FW: Selling older Extended Solutions to existing customers

We can sell this to them since it’s one of the 56 extended solutions that will be eventually embedded into the product but it has to be for MAS90/200 version 4.3 only!!

Thanks,

yyy

Sage Changes Policy – Will Sell Kept Extended Solutions At Older Version Until Incorporated

Late last night I was told there is a policy shift.

Sage will now sell any of the 56 Extended Solutions that they are keeping (does not appear to apply to the Extended Solutions that they’ve open sourced to developers) at levels earlier than 4.3 – up into when those solutions are actually incorporated to 4.4.

This means if you are on version 4.1 and need a “kept” solution such as AP-1095 Paperless Office AP Checks & Direct Deposit Stubs that you can continue to buy it up until the time it’s rolled into V4.4+.

This is extremely good news for those existing customers on maintenance with  a supported version of Sage MAS 90 or MAS 200 prior to 4.3. It means that if their business conditions require them to adopt one of  the 56 kept solutions that they can purchase that solution today rather than upgrade to 4.3 solely to qualify for the purchase of an Extended Solution.

There are a myriad of valid reasons that customers don’t upgrade immediately to the latest versions. Some customers have extensive enhancements to MAS90/200 that require testing and custom programming prior to any upgrade. Other customers may be subject to stricter compliance regulations (lending institutions, auditors, Sarbanes Oxley, governmental regulation) that don’t allow for a hasty upgrade.

Here is the link to the list of Extended Solutions to which the policy applies:

http://www.sagemas.com/products/sagemas90_mas200/extended_solutions/