Published on: Wednesday 20th May, 2015 Software will be used to process up to 200 invoices a day

Askham Bryan College will implement finance management and integrated electronic workflow software from Advanced Business Solutions (Advanced) following a period of growth that has seen turnover double in four years. The College is anticipating better and more efficient financial reporting when it goes live with the solutions in June 2015.

Following a merger with Newton Rigg College in Cumbria, Askham Bryan College in York found that its existing finance system was no longer fit for purpose.

The finance team processes up to 200 invoices a day, which will be scanned into and viewed in Advanced's financial management system OpenAccounts, using V1 document management technology. These solutions, alongside electronic workflow solution eBIS, will replace a financial management system which has been in place for 10 years.

Advanced was selected from five providers via the Crescent Purchasing Consortium (CPC) framework. It was chosen for its competitive pricing and user-friendliness.

Carol Butterill, Head of Finance, Askham Bryan College, says, "Our current finance system is very laborious in terms of extracting financial information, using spreadsheets to produce financial reports and storing paper copies of invoices. It simply is not enabling us to work effectively enough to keep pace with the College's growth.

"I am very much looking forward to producing reports, which can be generated at the click of a button and being able to scan invoices which can be viewed instantly online."

OpenAccounts will be used to generate monthly management accounts as well as monthly reports for the College's 40 budget-holders and reports for the governing body every few months.

V1's document management software will enable administrators and budget holders based at the College's eight sites, to upload invoices straight into the finance system rather than mailing paper invoices to the central finance team, and to see source information when reviewing their budgets.

The eBIS workflow will push invoices through the system and automatically email them to the correct people for authorisation. The solutions are integral to Askham Bryan College's aim to eliminate the use of paper invoices, contributing to its green agenda.

Butterill adds, "I am anticipating a much easier way of working that will reduce paper flow around the College, improve financial control in the procurement process and ensure a consistent way of working throughout the sites.

"At the moment it takes a team of three people several days to produce financial reports and this technology will enable us to reduce this significantly. I am sure the systems will increase efficiency and save time, but even more importantly, the quality of reports will improve because we will be able to spend more time on analysis rather than just extracting and reconciling data.

"We are continually analysing and presenting huge volumes of data in different ways to different stakeholders and Advanced's technology will be the key to doing this in the most transparent and efficient way."

distributed by