With extensive experience in the museums and leisure venues sector, PS Financials was chosen by the Imperial War Museum to provide its new core financial accounting software.
Opened in 1920, the Imperial War Museum is the national museum of the experiences of people who have lived, fought and died in conflicts involving Britain and the Commonwealth since 1914. It is the museum of everyone's story: the history of modern war and people's experience of war and wartime life in Britain and the Commonwealth. It is an educational and historical institution responsible for archives, collections and sites of outstanding national importance.
Alongside its main London site, the Imperial War Museum has four other locations in the United Kingdom; Imperial War Museum Duxford in Cambridgeshire, the Churchill Museum and Cabinet War Rooms, and HMS Belfast both situated in London and Imperial War Museum North in Manchester. The Museum welcomed almost 2 million visitors to its branches in 2005-2006 and employs around 600 staff.
The Museum is partly funded by Grant-in-Aid from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, but also receives major financial contributions from its commercial trading activities, which are operated by the Museum's Trading Company, and sponsorship and donations. In the financial year 2005-2006, the Imperial War Museum had a turnover of more than £32 million.
Finding new Accounting Software became a necessary tactic
The decision by the Imperial War Museum to move to new accounting software was taken after their existing financial software providers announced that they would no longer be supporting the version used by the Museum. The Museum undertook research into replacement software, with a particular emphasis on what added benefits to the business a new system could bring.
Solutions from five financial software providers were short listed for closer inspection - Exchequer, Sun, Microsoft Great Plains, Access Accounts and PS Financials. As well as drawing up a matrix of functions required from the different systems, the Museum favoured a face-to-face, detailed hands-on approach to selecting the replacement financial software solution.
PS Financials' clean interface makes it the preferred option for finance staff
"We wanted software suppliers to come and demonstrate their systems to both our senior and junior staff so we could get a good feel for the products themselves," recalls Gail Williams, the Chief Accountant. "It was important that we identified a system which would be clear, simple and intuitive to use as well as providing significant enhancements."
The short listed software providers were asked to return to present to the Museum's finance staff in London, demonstrating exactly how each system would handle processes such as journals, BACs payments, integration with other systems and producing reports. They were also asked to provide details about the standard implementation times for the systems.
When asked to identify their preferred software system from the short listed applications, the Museum's finance staff were particularly impressed with the straightforward appearance of the PS Financials interface.
"All our end users found the PS Financials software a lot cleaner and easier to look at than the other systems," added Gail.
References from other Museums demonstrated PS Financials' experience
Gail and the staff involved with the decision-making process also spoke to several other large museums that were already using PS Financials to help inform their choice.
"We spoke with the National Museums of Wales, the National Maritime Museum and the National Portrait Gallery, who were all using PS Financials. They all gave a very favourable report of the system and their experiences which helped to support the decisions we were making."
Aside from its ease of use, several other factors influenced the Imperial War Museum's decision to choose PS Financials for its new accounting software.
"We decided to choose PS Financials for its accounts structure, reporting tools and competitive pricing," comments Gail.
"We also wanted the facility to raise sales invoices and distribute reports via a web portal across the Internet, and PS Financials has excellent web functionality"
"It also had the functionality to enable us to build an excellent integrated link between the Museum's existing web based purchase ordering system - Soprano"
Implementation of PS Financials took place across five locations simultaneously
The implementation process is scheduled to take three months, with PS Financials being rolled out across all the five Museum locations at the same time. The organisation's main accounting function is at the main offices in London, with a second function in Duxford. At the other Museum locations there is an Accounts Officer who will have remote access to the system. The 26 finance staff who will use the system will be trained using the PS Financials 'train the trainer' approach, which means that a number of staff will be chosen to undertake the initial training process and they will then be coached in order that they can pass on their knowledge to other users. A further 15 staff across the Museum's sites will be using the system to process sales invoices through the web portal.
Purchase and Sales ledger data will be brought across from the old accounting software, and while the Museum's existing retail and admissions systems will be retained and will work alongside the new PS Financials system, there are plans to integrate these in future - as the flexibility of PS Financials makes this a straightforward option to undertake.
PS Financials will help to make efficiency gains and change the way the Museum works
The Imperial War Museum expects to see a number of efficiency gains with PS Financials.
"Firstly, we expect to see improvements in our bank reconciliation, by making the process more automated. We also expect data entry to become more streamlined - as staff will be required to raise sales invoices locally, this will remove much of the duplicate inputting we experience with our existing system and processes", comments Gail, which will save time and increase accuracy.
Devolving sales invoicing to business units is not the only change the Museum plans to put in place once the new PS Financials system is fully operational. Managers will be provided with access to constantly updated, real-time financial reports through a new web portal.
"This will provide directors and senior staff with the financial information they need to make better informed management decisions", notes Gail.
The new system will also allow reports to be produced on demand for the Museum's single business function units.
"We run a variety of events across all the branches, so to be able to produce P&Ls quickly and have them updating automatically for these will be a major step forward", comments Gail.
"In addition, the Vision reporting tool will greatly increase the speed at which our year-end reports can be produced. Once built, the spreadsheets will be able to produce reports straight from the system."
The cost and staff time savings are clear
Over time, the Imperial War Museum is expecting to make cost savings in both maintaining their new accounting software, and in efficiency of staff.
"We are expecting the costs of the new system to be the same as if we had upgraded our existing system, and we expect an annual saving in maintenance costs", notes Gail.
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