Inquiry pages or list pages are very common and widely used to gather operational reporting data in Finance and Operations. An inquiry page in Finance and Operation presents a set of data on a user interface and lets users search, filter, and sort that data. For further analysis, the user can export the data into Microsoft Excel.

Excel has always been the ultimate choice for viewing data easily and quickly, converting it into information using charts and pivots, making informed decisions, and sharing those decisions with the other stakeholders.

Using the following steps, the user can export list page data to Excel:

1. Navigate to page: The user navigates to inquiry pages using the navigation pane or uses the search button at the top to open the form. In the following screenshot, you are seeing this and the next step in Finance and Operations to export inquiry page data to Excel:

2. Filter data: Then, as shown in the preceding screenshot, the user can use the filter pane on the list page to apply the required filters. Let's have a look at the following screenshot:

3. Click on Office icon: The user then clicks the Office icon.
4. Export to Excel: The user selects the entity to export list page data to Excel, as seen in the preceding screenshot.
5. Download: After exporting, the user downloads the data to a local machine or exports the data directly to OneDrive for Business or SharePoint Online.

Throughout Finance and Operations, there are many purpose-built inquiry pages in every module covering various operational reporting scenarios. Users can further personalize these pages by rearranging them and adding new or hiding fields.

Using the Saved view feature in Finance and Operations, users can create and save multiple optimized views of a page so that it suits the needs of performing a particular business task or operational report.

The following screenshot shows the Saved view feature in Finance and Operations, through the use of which a user can create multiple optimized views (1) and use them in different business scenarios:

Saved views that have been created by users can also include user-added filters or sorts, which allows users to quickly return to commonly filtered datasets. Further saved views can be published (2) to security roles (3) to allow access to all the users who have security roles assigned to them.

To summarize inquiry pages for operational reporting, inquiry pages provide easy personalization, filtering, and sorting capabilities, and have the following highlights and limitations:

• Their highlights are as follows:
  • Personalization
  • Easy filtering and sorting
  • Can export to Excel
• Their limitations are as follows:
  • Not printer-friendly
  • No automated delivery
  • No calculations

Now, let's take a look at the printer-friendly SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) reporting option in Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations.