Backup is one of those issues that is so important it’s almost impossible to over emphasize it. I’m a big fan of the sister companies IBackup and IDrive as a reliable and affordable way to get an off-site backup. But because your accounting data is so important I still recommend using Sage 50’s built in backup feature. If you need to move back to a specific point in time, having a Sage 50 created backup will make that much easier. But remembering to make that backup, and finding a time when nobody is in Sage 50 can be a challenge. That’s were Sage 50’s automatic backup scheduler comes in.

You may already have a shortcut to it on your desktop, or you may have deleted it after getting tired of repeatedly clicking on the wrong Sage 50 icon. If it’s not on your desktop, you can get to it from the Start menu, but the easiest method is to open your company in Sage 50, go to the File menu, and choose Automatic Backup.

The first thing you need to do is tell it where the company is that you want to back up. If opened the automatic backup from the Sage 50 File menu, the current company’s location will already be filled it.But if you launched it from your desktop or the start menu, you’ll have to click the Browse button and choose the folder. This needs to be the folder that holds your company’s data, not the folder named “Company.”

Next you set the Save Backup To location. This can be wherever you want. If you do not have an offsite backup, you should definitely save this to a different drive, preferably a different computer, than the one your Sage 50 data is stored on to keep yourself protected in case of hard drive failure or theft. If you do have an offsite backup make sure that, wherever you choose to save the Sage 50 backups, they get included in your offsite backup.

After that, enter your Sage 50 user name and password. Click the Verify User Details button to make sure they are entered correctly.

Now you can choose your backup settings. You can choose to use the company name in the backup file name (recommended), and whether or not to include archived companies and attachments in your backup. You can also choose what to do if a backup with the same name already exists. Your options are to automatically create a new backup file, overwrite the existing backup file,or stop the process.

The final setting is the option to log out uses prior to running the backup. If you do not check this box and someone has Sage 50 open at the time the backup is scheduled, the backup will not run. If you check the and someone has Sage 50 open at the time the backup is scheduled, they will be logged out of Sage 50 without warning and any unsaved work will be lost. The bottom line here is that users should never leave Sage 50 open at the end of the day, even if you’re not using the automatic backup.

Once you have completed all of the settings, click the Save button and give the file a name. This is just the name for the file that holds your backup settings, not the name of the actual backup files that will be created.

Now you are ready to schedule your backup. Click the Schedule button and choose the schedule that you want. Remember, it should be set to run at a time when no one will be using Sage 50. When you’re done, click OK. The scheduling utilizes Widows’ built in task scheduler. One of its requirements is that you have to have a password set for your Windows user name. After you click OK, you’ll be prompted to enter your password. This is your Windows/network password, not your Sage 50 password. If you don’t have a Windows password, you will have to set one up before you can schedule your automatic backup.