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Email Reports: Email a PDF Document | Paste from the Clipboard

Free email services (like Gmail, AOL, Yahoo, MSN, Hotmail, etc.) are notorious for blocking attachments. Contact your ISP and ask them how to use your (free) email account with them.

If you are using a web mail service (like Gmail or Hotmail or your ISP's web mail service), send an email to your recipient and attach the BCSS Agreement or report.
(The following instructions include images from Windows Vista. You may see different but similar views on your computer.)

Create, Save and Email a PDF (Portable Document File)

Download and install the free PDFCreator from http://www.pdfforge.org/products/pdfcreator. (This program will allow you to save, print and email BCSS Reports in PDF format.)
Read instructions for PDFCreator configuration.
Go to the Desktop and right click anywhere away from icons. Select New then Folder. Enter Customers for a folder name. This will be used later.
Prepare a Consignment Agreement or Report in BCSS.

While viewing the Agreement or Report in Print Preview, click the Print Button:

Please note: At one time it was possible to click on the Email Button (circled in red above) and mail the Report from the Print-Preview Screen. A Windows update somewhere along the way disabled this function on many machines. It might work on yours. Microsoft is aware of this but updating these functions isn't on the priority list. This is not a malfunction of BCSS. Print Preview and the functions on the Print-Preview Screen are products of Microsoft.

The Windows Print-Setup Screen will open.
Click the drop-down arrow (yellow arrow) and select PDFCreator for the printer:
Click OK. Don't click Mail.
The next screen in Windows 7 (named Create PDF) is an 'input screen' allowing optional entries for Save In, File name, File type, PDF Options and Document Properties. (The Vista screen is somewhat different. It shows 'Document Properties'.)
To the right of the 'Save in' field, click on the drop-down arrow then Desktop then the Customers folder:
Click in the 'File name' field and enter a name for the file, like Smith-Jackie-11-11-10. (File names of lastname-firstname-date will make sorting and finding files easier later.) It is not necessary to type '.pdf' after the filename. Windows will add it when the document is created.
To prevent viewing each document after it is saved, in Win7, use the drop-down menu and select 'Do not open after creation'. (In Vista, take the check out of 'After saving open...'.) It may be desirable to view the PDF after it is created, because most PDF programs include an option (under File in the PDF program) for emailing PDFs as attachments.
In Win7 click 'Create' to save the document. In Vista, click Save.

Email the Report

There are several ways to email reports, depending upon which email program is used.

When emailing reports, it's a handy time saver to have a text file open that contains repetitive phrases that can be copied and pasted into email messages. Outlook also provides for 'signatures' which will be auto-added at the end of email messages. (In Outlook, click on Tools, Options, Mail Format, Signatures. For help, close the Tools screens and click on Help in Outlook and search for signatures.)

Email a Saved Report using Microsoft Mail, Outlook and other POP Email Clients

On the Desktop double click on the folder named Customers.
Find the report to be emailed.
Right click on the report and select Send To.
Select Mail Recipient.
Enter an e-mail address, a subject and a message.
Press Send.

Email the Report using Web-Based Email Clients

For Gmail, YMail, Hotmail, other 'free email programs' or your ISP's web mail service: Send an email to your recipient and attach the file. Expect problems with free email services. They save money (bandwidth) by dropping email attachments. Your ISP's email account is a better bet.

Copy/Paste Shortcut Method

While viewing the 'Print-Preview Screen' in BCSS, click the Copy to Clipboard icon:

It will appear as though nothing had happened but in the background, Windows copied the Print Preview of the report to the Clipboard.

Open a new email message using your email software program. Enter the recipient's email address, a subject and a message.

Click after the message, Hold the Control Key down and press the letter V to paste the report into the body of the email. Press Send.

This method may or may not work depending upon your email program. As an alternative, it is possible to paste the report in Microsoft Word or Excel (and other similar programs), save and email the document from within Word or Excel (under File).

Send Mass Mail

Send a 'personalized' email to a list of recipients, addressing each person by his or her first name in the email greeting:

In BCSS under Utilities, select Export CSV Consignors (or Buyers for those who purchase from your store). See Export Information to be used in other programs for details.
Download the free demo of an email program, Turbomailer.
Use Turbomailer to send the same email to a list of recipients. Each email can be 'personalized' using a greeting containing each person's first name.
Extract email addresses and first names from the CSV Export.
Refer to Turbomailer documentation for further instructions.

Troubleshooting

When using an email software program on your computer, all email settings (POP, SMTP, username, password) must be correct. These values can only be obtained from your email provider whether that be Google, MSN or your ISP (Internet Service Provider).

When printing with BCSS, be sure that the printer works with another program. If you elected to print using BCSS and it appears that nothing happened, go to the Control Panel. Click on Printers then click on your printer's listing to see if the printed report appears in the 'print queue'. If it is there, your printer may not be functioning or it may be necessary in BCSS to go to File > Program Setup > Printers and select your printer as the Document Printer.

Document Properties

Document Properties are only viewable by right-clicking on a PDF file and selecting Properties. In most cases Document Properties can be ignored.

Document Title: During PDFCreator setup, we had the option of entering a default Filename or not. If a Filename was entered in setup, it will appear here as the Document Title. If a Filename was not entered in setup, the Document Title field will be blank. Either way you can enter anything you like in this field. Your entry will become the Document Title and the Filename for the saved document. When searching later for a specific document, it will be easier to find (using Windows Explorer Search) if Document Titles (Filenames) are named with consistency, like lastname-firstname-date as in this example of Johnson-Mary-9-1-2009:

The Creation Date and Modify Date can be left as is. They are 'date/time stamps' and include the year, the day, the month and the time (last 8 digits).

The Author will only appear in the PDF Document Properties. This can be set in PDFCreator setup, typed in or left blank.

The Subject is the Email Subject. (We've suggested to the provider of this program to label this field as 'Email Subject' and to add an option in setup to enter a default subject.)

Keywords are a way of 'tagging' documents so they may be found in Windows Explorer searches searching by keywords. This option may or may not be of use to you. It can be left blank.

For free email support, send us an email. (Add the domain name mm.st to your email program's Approved Senders List or White List to lessen the chance that spam filters will block our emails to you. (Instructions) For phone and remote PC help, contact: Joy Archer, enJoy Consigning Services, 972-898-7921 (NY), Email, or Computer Mechanics, 800-448-1436 (MI), email.