FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS – Leyburn Solutions

Below is a list of the questions we get asked most frequently about Sage 50 Accounts…

When I run Check Data, I get errors, what should I do?

When data is corrupt, you MUST (and I cannot stress this highly enough) get it fixed – with errors, the program will not function properly and it is likely that your accounts are currently incorrect. You have the following options:

You can try the following first albeit, depending on the exact errors, you may find that this actually increases the number of errors.

Take a backup.
Run the Clear Audit Trail (Tools -> Period End) with a date of 01/01/1980. (This rebuilds the Audit Trail without actually removing any transactions)
Run ReIndex and Compress on all files.
Run Check Data.
If there are still errors, run Fix.
Run Check Data.

If, after following the procedure above, you still have errors, they will need to be fixed so you can either restore a ‘clean’ backup of the data that has no errors and then re-enter all records since the backup was taken or, take advantage of our ‘no fix, no fee’ data fixing service, further details of which can be found here.

For versions of Sage 50 prior to v2015, corruption can often be caused by network settings. In particular, a setting called SMB2 which, if switched on (which it is by default), is known to cause corruption in Sage. Adept are the authors of the Sage 50 Health Check tool, an essential tool for anyone experiencing speed or corruption problems when running over a network. The tool will run a number of speed/settings checks and will allow settings (including SMB2) to be changed to be ‘Sage friendly’ – I recommend it to all my clients.

How does Sage 50 determine where it’s data files are stored?

The data files are stored in a file called COMPANY which can be opening in Notepad. The file is in the folder c:\programdata\sage\accounts\XXXX where XXXX is the version of Sage you are running.

Bear in mind that, by default, the programdata folder is hidden in Windows so you need to have the option to show hidden files and folders switched on.

By editing the COMPANY file, it is possible to change the folder that is used to store the Sage data.

User Name is Already in Use / Cannot Access YYY because XXX is logged in / Program hangs at Splash Screen.

Typically, when you get this message you will be asked if you want to remove the user. If you are asked this question, simply answer Yes and you’ll be able to continue. If you get the message when trying to access a particular option in Sage, try logging off and log on as the user in question and you should be asked if you want to remove the user.

An alternative solution is to go in the data folder for the specific company and, in there, you will find a file called QUEUE.DTA – delete the file and you should be able to get back into Line 50. Note: If you have a multi user version of Sage 50, you should only delete this file if you are sure that no-one else is using Sage 50.

If you do not know which folder your data is stored in, if you can log in to Sage as a different user, go to Help -> About or find the data path using the method described above to find the COMPANY file.

Would you like to check for updates?

If you constantly get this message and, after checking, you get a message that there are none and you are up to date, you need to delete a file. The file you need to delete is called WATERMARK.XML and is in the COMPANY.XXX folder that relates to your data.

Invalid Password

If you get this message having restored a backup from, for example, your accountant then it is caused by the data having been accessed in a later version of the software than the one you are using so, for example, if you are on v18, your accountant has worked on the data in v22 and you’ve then restored a backup from the accountant you would get this message as v19 cannot read the data from v22.

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