Information Systems:CheqMaster
Overview
Cheque Master a.k.a. Chequemaster is used to print cheques in A/P.
We do not print cheques on the i (i.e ASW); instead we use a PC package that prints as well as keeping a cheque register. The cheque is generated by ASW, but instead of printing, the spool file is sent to the IFS, where Cheque Master can read and process it. When completed, the file is moved to an archive folder.
Technical Support
Michael Guenzel (pronounced Gun zel, accent on second syllable) VisionCraft Suite 1600 Sun Life Plaza 144 - 4th Avenue SW Calgary, Alberta, Canada T2P 3N4 Tel: (403) 232-6080 or (800) 265-6080 Fax: (403) 547-6213 mguenzel@visioncraft.com
iSeries Setup
Created an outq named CHEQUE in library QUSRSYS, which is not attached to a printer, but will be used to store the spool file until the cheques have printed.
Created a folder named ChqMaster in the IFS, that contains the VISION programs, cheque printing files, and an archive folder of completed cheque files.
Created a data file named APCHEQUE, that the spool files will be copied into.
Changed the RPGLE program FLR128 (Cheque printout - Blank stock) to put the cheque spool file into the outq CHEQUE, with a status of HOLD.
Changed the CLLE program FLC128 (Cheque printout – Blank stock) to copy the spool file to the file APCHEQUE, and then to ChqMaster in the IFS.
Cheque Printer
The cheque printer is an HP LaserJet printer capable of printing MICR font. It is served on the network by superserver as chqprt. This device name is important for the program to recognize it.
Cheqmaster is set to print to port LPT2 (via a setting in General Administration). Since this is a physical port, the CHEQUES2 bat file that is used to start Cheqmaster issues a net use command to specify/spoof the network printer chqprt as existing on port LPT2.
Signatures
The signature tool (signature.exe) is on tech/common/iSeries/Vision AP Cheques/signature. However, as it is a .net application, it will not currently run from a network drive, so it must be (temporarily) copied to a local drive.
The first step is to print the Signature Template (the form to be used to scan in signatures). Load the signature tool, and press the template button. Select the printer, press Print, then OK.
Have the signing officers sign this sheet. Note that in our test, the signature had to be approximately a quarter of an inch in from the side borders. Scan the sheet as TIF, black and white, at 300 dpi.
Go back into the signature tool. Press the Graphic File Select button, highlight the scanned file, and press Open. The template will appear in the box to the left. Click on the black square to the upper left to select a signature.
The selected signature will appear in the Signature box to the right. Use the scroll bars to center it between the lines.
Go to the Signature ID box and select either the Top or Bottom Signature. Press the Output File Select button. The selections will be automatically set for current directory, with the correct file name for the chosen signature ID, and the correct type. Press Save. Note, however, that this does NOT save the object; it just does the preparation. Press the Save button in the lower right corner to write the selected output file.
Repeat for both the top and bottom signature. When complete, copy visionB.bin and visionT.bin to the finance/vision folder on the iSeries.
It is possible to adjust the positions of the signatures and the micr line. Edit the text file MICR_ADJ.VCD to do this. The first pair of numbers is the X and Y co-ordinates of the micr line, the middle pair is the top signature, and the last pair is the bottom signature. ‘+’ means down or to the right. ‘-‘ is up or to the left. The unit of measure is 300th of an inch. Be very careful to make no other changes to this file.
Print A/P Cheques
Create A/P payment proposal, and do any maintenance necessary. When ready, do an option 8 – payment order. This will generate cheques, but will not print them. Instead the spool file will be copied to a shared folder, from where a PC cheque application will be able to print them.
Using explorer, double click on the drive mapped to finance/vision on BART. Key in your user ID and password to allow you to access the application and cheque printing files. This step only has to be done once a day.
Click on the A/P Cheque icon, and print cheques.
When the cheques have been successfully printed, go back to the iSeries. Confirm and update the A/P payment proposal.
Eventually, the outq and the APCHEQUES data file will have to be cleared.
Potential Problems
Signatures
If either the signatures or the micr line are not in the correct location, they can be moved. See the section on ‘Signatures’ for instructions on how to this.
Load forms first
Cheque forms must be loaded before printing starts. If the cheque printer does not have cheque forms loaded, nothing will print. When this happens, cheques must be voided and recreated.
Error message when reading cheque file
Message is “An unrecoverable error occurred during the preview scanning of the current file – call Vision Craft at 403-232-6000 for assistance”. Only the person that creates the cheque file in ASW can print it with ChqMaster. Whoever logged onto the computer (Windows logon) needs authority to the cheque files. Any IT person can go into iSeries Navigator and change the permissions on the cheque files.
Disappearing data / signatures (really a printing issue)
The transit # in the MICR line was changed in the test system to prepare for corporate clearing. Nancy turned off signatures, printed cheques from an old test file, and they looked fine. A few minutes later, when Mary printed production cheques, they came out blank, except for variable data -- no headings, no company name, no MICR line. We reset the printer, and Mary backed out of Chqmaster and went back in, but she still got an unusual message about signatures. We thought it was okay for her to proceed. Everything looked okay (including transit #), except the production cheques were missing signatures.
ANSWER: Mary got the message about the signatures because the file had already been printed. Chqmaster was flagging that a supervisor would need to be involved for signatures on the second run.
The reason the headings, company name, MICR line, etc. were dropped on Mary's first cheque run -- a coincidence of timing. Between Mary's pressing F1 and printing the cheques, Nancy logged out of Chqmaster. The act of logging out deleted all the data that Mary's F1 had set up. In short, the printer was made unready to receive Chqmaster data.
User cannot print or connect to printer
One of the steps in the CheqMaster routine is Initialize Printer, in which the program tries to connect to a printer on port LPT2. If this step doesn't work, the program was likely run via the executable, cheques.exe, rather than the batch file, which sets up the printer port first. Run CHEQUES2.bat instead.
Log into Cheque Master. The program is cheques.exe, but the desktop icon is the easiest way to get in. Id and password are in CONFIGUR.VCD, which can be emailed to Michael Guenzel mguenzel@vision-craft.com in the event of a problem. First try restoring the contents of ChqMaster from the most recent backup.
From the Main Menu, F6 Administration
F3 Forms Maintenance: There will be 3 forms – CAD, USD, and Imp and three actions – add, change, delete.
F2 Change / Select form (CAD)
F8 Edit MICR line: overtype field to be changed (e.g., change branch transit number 00900 to 30120)
Press Enter
F9 repeatedly to get out
Print a test cheque
Technical Notes
- The cheque file is simply a text file with a .dat extension. It can be opened with Notepad to examine the cheque data for troubleshooting purposes. *DO NOT ALTER THE FILE UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES.*
- The cheque file is placed on the IFS. Ensure that the user generating cheques has read/write privileges to the IFS share, otherwise the process will stop mid-way and no file will be available to print.
- Following the Windows 11 24H2 update, Legacy Console hosting has been disabled by default. However, Cheqmaster requires this feature to display correctly.
To resolve this, we need to log in with an administrator account on the affected user PCs and manually re-enable Legacy Console hosting by following these steps: 1. Open Start > Settings > System > Optional features 2. Click Add an optional feature 3. Search for Legacy Console hosting and install it
Tags: Cheque master, Chequemaster