Never ‘forget’ to charge your customer again

Re-gain control of your projects with an Order-to-Cash system which brings all project data and controls to your fingertips

Overview

Nesscomp is an IT services company that delivers projects of diverse scale. We provide ongoing IT infrastructure maintenance and support services, build business applications and websites, install new servers and networks, re-sell third party services like hosting, warranties. These projects vary in size and complexity, but all will always involve a mixture of:

Project initiation (tender, quotation, telephone or web order)
Purchasing of equipment and third party services
Receiving equipment deliveries
Time sheet management for supplied labour
Shipping equipment and delivering third party services
Paying suppliers
Accounts payable
Accounts receivable

In the past we used a combination of disparate tools to manage these processes, mainly accounting systems and a host of Microsoft Excel spreadsheets.

Challenge

With a growing number of concurrent projects, and considerably more project transactions needing to be processed, tracking of projects became a real challenge. Key challenges we encountered were:

Ensuring that ALL re-sold equipment and third party services were invoiced and paid for
Maintaining cash flow by invoicing customers for deliverables as soon as contractually possible
Keeping track of time spent by employees on individual projects and bill accurately
Managing project with ineffective tools resulting in document duplications and lacking integrity
Inability to accurately record time spent on projects leading to under-billing for labour - in some instances we ‘forgot’ to bill a customer for delivered equipment

Rectification of all these issues cost a lot in additional management time

Solution

By modelling the gaps and inefficiencies we had been experiencing, and reviewing how we wanted to control our projects and order fulfilment - we realised how much of our work was process based. So using the Metastorm BPM platform, a world class workflow toolkit, we built an Order-to-Cash solution.

Now all project data is stored in a single system, easily accessible over the Internet. All information is distributed through electronic forms. Management and employees can access and update, subject to their roles and permissions, all the crucial business information, allowing making smart and fast decisions.

The solution encapsulates key business processes: project inception and fulfilment, customers and suppliers management, purchase orders processing, equipment purchase and delivery tracking, recording time for labour and billing, sales invoicing, tasks management, management admin forms and reporting.

The system specifically targets activities related to management and delivery of projects. We have not attempted to replace existing specialist systems such as Sage accounting application, as these systems are perfect for their primary functions, plus accountants and bookkeepers know them well. However, we have produced interfaces which pass the information to and from our new system.

Results

The Order-to-Cash system has dramatically improved the control of our projects. Having all project related information (project details, customer contacts, attached quotes and other documents, financial details, equipment serial numbers, time records, history of actions, invoices, etc.) in one place and at our finger tips has simplified the whole process.

All steps of the process are always carried out in the same way, thus introducing a lot of quality - handy for ISO certification. Standard automations such as delivery of equipment to the client triggering invoicing ensure that we receive payments in a timely fashion.

One of the key benefits is the way in which we now handle timesheet management. The ease of use of electronic timesheets and their availability over the Internet from client sites has increased accuracy and reduced granularity of time recording. We can now book time as accurately as the best lawyers and accountants in the country! This in turn has increased client satisfaction and trust as we are able to present the client with a detailed bill and invoice for every minute spent on the job.

There are many other benefits of this new system. To discuss them without any obligation in a friendly conversation over the phone, please call us on +44 20 8434 3605 (alternatively send us an email, or fill in an enquiry form).