Setting up a mail merge or report letter

[AndrewsPanda]

I am trying to work out the best way to go about this. I currently have no
idea how it would work so any help would be appreciated. Also I don't know
VBA.

Mail merge might best suit my need. I just want to set this up as easy and
simple as possible so my Dad can use it.

We are trying to send out Confirmation letters for the First Aid Courses to a
number of Companies attending the course.

The information that needs to be inserted into the letter is:

Companies Contact Person
-First name
-Last Name

Course Date
Course Time


Course Location

The contact person is kept in my Customers table. Ideally I want to be able
to select a few companies that are going to be in the course. Then enter the
course information which would apply to all of those companies.

Once all of that information is selected/entered it would need to be
automatically brought across to Word Mail Merge Document or access report.
Whichever one will work best.

Please excuse my noob questions

EDIT: The way I thought this would work best is using a form. If I had the ability to select the companies attending the course on the form. Then type in the course information into the boxes. Then have all of that information sent over to Word mail merge.

[alansidman]

Here is one solution that you could use without having to do a mail merge with WORD

http://www.datapigtechnologies.com/f...mailmerge.html

Alan

[AndrewsPanda]

That was really helpful in learning how to set up the letter using report in Access.

However I am still left with the complicated issue.

First complicated issue is my Dad will be using it when doing confirmation letters and he doesn't know how to customize queries to select the customer. So eliminating that would be great.

Also the "course information" isn't kept in a table like the customer information. The course information which is "Course date, course time, course location" only applies once to those customers attending that course.

Thats why I thought it would be good if I could set up perhaps a form screen, where I could select the Companies, put in the course information and that information is then used in the "report" or mail merge.

[alansidman]

First complicated issue is my Dad will be using it when doing confirmation letters and he doesn't know how to customize queries to select the customer. So eliminating that would be great.

Suggest you set up a search for that will trigger a query. Use a combo box with a list of customer names. Here is an example but will need to modify the text box to a combo box.

http://www.datapigtechnologies.com/f...earchform.html

For the dates and places and course, I would set up a new table that would be linked to your query and eventually to your report that could be selected in a similar search manner.

Alan

[AndrewsPanda]

Ok I have given it a go. However I don't think that will help the situation.

I did set up another table with all of the course information. (that helped)

So my current set up is.

Form = Enter the course information which reflects on the course information table (Using 1 record)

Query = I have included the Companies from my database and also the course information with a refined query that only uses the course information I input in the form.

Report = I have made the Confirmation letter with it pulling the right information in the right places from the fields in the query.

However I would also like to have on the form the ability for my Dad to select the company he wants to have in that query. So then all he has to do is press the button and it will open up the updated report (confirmation letter) with the "Company" information from the query.

What you showed me in that tutorial seems to be a way to run a query in a form. However I need to be able to "select" or input the company information into a box on the form that will then put the information in the field in the query.

[alansidman]

Next step is to change the text box on the search form to a combo box. On this page are three tutorials on combo boxes -- scroll down and watch them.

http://www.datapigtechnologies.com/AccessMain.htm

With combo boxes in place, you can then select to whom the letters will go to, which classes and times, etc and then click on the command button to make the query and create the report.

Post back with any issues.

[AndrewsPanda]

Thank you very much for the help!! I learnt how the combo box worked and was then able to apply some of the other tutorial on controlling the query from the form and linked the query to the combo box.

Once I select the company from the drop down box I have to press a button to run the query to update it. I'm not sure if there is a way for it to automatically update the query behind the scenes when you select the company from the combo box. Either way I am very happy with how it is working now.

[alansidman]

You could put an event in the afterupdate property for the combo box, but personally, I think that you are better off with a command button to cause the query to run.

Congratulations on getting this solved and working.

Alan

[AndrewsPanda]

Yeah I agree. Why fix something that's not broken right? I have posted a thread to a new task that I am tackling and would appreciate your help.

https://www.accessforums.net/import-...html#post80953

Thanks again.