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When the Government's ChangeUp initiative offered Ryedale Voluntary Action, Whitby and Scarborough Voluntary Services in North Yorkshire an excellent opportunity to boost the efficiency of their financial processes and planning, PS Financials Community Edition maximised their return. |
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Ryedale Voluntary Action, the Scarborough & District Council for Voluntary Service and Whitby and District Voluntary Action provide support, advice, services and facilities to voluntary and community groups in their local areas. All are small organisations with limited funds available to them for improving back office systems. They had however signed up to the 'ChangeUp' scheme aiming to improve the infrastructure of CVS's through collaborative working and were keen to take this further.
ChangeUp is a central government fund aimed at improving the support services available to the voluntary & community sector so that they become more effective and efficient. Seeing a positive opportunity to work together for their joint benefit, the three voluntary organisations formed a consortium to apply for funding from ChangeUp to procure new financial systems, with Ryedale Voluntary Action appointed lead organisation.
As Ryedale Voluntary Action's Finance Manager Tracy Bramley explains, "A new system was the only way of improving efficiencies. There is complex and time consuming accounting involved in running a voluntary organisation which we struggle to do with the basic systems we have at present". (Ryedale Voluntary Action and Scarborough CVS have been using Sage Line 50, while Whitby CVS have relied solely on Excel spreadsheets for their financial reporting). |
Tracy was appointed Project Leader to undertake research into possible software options and evaluate needs. The Consortium was given free reign to choose a suitable software system, and so a detailed software specification was developed and a shortlist of four suitable packages identified. The four options chosen - Sage MMS version, Sun Systems, Exchequer Enterprise and PS Financials - were looked at in detail and the consortium viewed demonstrations from Sage, Sun Systems and PS Financials before making their decision.
According to Tracy, "We were won over with PS Financials because we immediately liked the screen layout and 'Windows' style - it's user-friendly and easy to get around. We were also impressed with the unified ledger and flexible reporting functions." |
