Upgrading from Microsoft Dynamics NAV to Business Central: What If We’re Not Ready?
We love Microsoft Dynamics NAV, and Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central is even more exciting. As the future for all our NAV customers, we are strongly advocating that they move to Business Central as soon as possible. But moving to Business Central can seem confusing – and challenging.
In this blog series, we tackle the most frequently asked questions from our customers so you can make an informed decision about when, why, and how you should plan to upgrade.
Read the first seven blogs in this series:
- What Will It Look Like?
- What are Events and Extensions?
- What About My Add-Ons?
- Moving Data
- How Long Will Our Upgrade Take?
- How Much Will This Upgrade Cost?
- What About Future Upgrades?
Question #8 – What if We’re Not Ready? What Can We Do Now to Make the Move Easier?
We understand that upgrading your current NAV implementation to Business Central can be a big investment, and not every organization is ready—for whatever reason—to make the move right now. However, it needs to happen at some point (hopefully sooner than later), and even if now is not the right time for you, there are things you can do now that will make moving to Business Central easier when the time comes.
1. Get it into your budget now! Start planning for it by getting it into your budget. It shouldn’t cost you anything to get a quote from a partner. In fact, ArcherPoint offers a quoting service free of charge that is very accurate—one you can take to your board or the bank. IMPORTANT: This is the time to ask your partner how much it will cost if you wait to upgrade..
2. Get current on your maintenance contract. This will make a big difference when it comes to the cost of your upgrade. Microsoft charges a penalty for each year you are not on maintenance, but they are also offering significant per-user discounts to customers that move to Business Central SaaS.
3. Start Eventing now. If you’re on NAV 2016 or later, start Eventing your customizations now, and make sure you use Events for all customizations moving forward.
4. Put extra development time towards Eventing. Tell staff developers and your NAV partner to use their downtime/extra budget to move your existing customizations to Events.
5. Consider a move to BC on premises now. Even if you’re not ready for the cloud, you can upgrade to BC on premises. It lays the foundation for moving to SaaS when and if you’re ready, reducing the time and effort required for that upgrade.
6. Talk to ArcherPoint about our Get Current, Stay Current Plan. This can significantly reduce the cost and risk of upgrading. It costs nothing to find out what it will take to upgrade! We’ll evaluate your current system, discuss your options, and give you a reliable cost quote.
We strongly encourage you to look to your Dynamics upgrade partner for help with deciding on your path to upgrading from NAV to BC. There are many considerations, but if you have a partner who understands the upgrade process and work closely with them on where you are now and where you want to be, the upgrade does not have to be painful. Also, talk to us (or have your partner talk to us) about the Get Current, Stay Current plan from ArcherPoint. This takes the burden off your shoulders and puts it into the hands of the experts.
Keep in mind that with the ArcherPoint Get Current, Stay Current Plan, you’ll never have to worry about upgrades again, regardless of how much your business changes or grows. The future is unknown, but the Plan removes the risk regardless of what the future brings. Find out more about the , or contact us by your preferred method on our Contact page.
To learn more answers to your upgrade questions, download this free eBook, Everything You Need to Know About Upgrading from Dynamics NAV to Business Central.