St Vincent de Paul Society Queensland

St Vincent de Paul Queensland enhanced budgeting processes and cut reporting turnaround from 30 days to 10 days

Case study highlights

  • Streamlined business processes
  • Cut down a 30 day reporting cycle to 10 days
  • New account structure improved productivity

The Challenge

St Vincent de Paul Society Queensland was seeking an integrated financial and budgeting system to replace its incumbent software. The Society required a system that could provide automated reporting and flexible accounting capabilities, to cater for its 650 local cost centres.

"We had some real non-negotiable requirements, and we were looking for someone who demonstrated they could deliver to those," says Chief Financial Officer, Deborah Nisbet.

"We wanted to move to a solution that was going to meet our needs, and offer efficiencies that we weren't previously achieving."

The Solution

St Vincent de Paul Society Queensland purchased TechnologyOne Financials and Enterprise Budgeting, which are key components of the OneCommunity solution. TechnologyOne continually collaborates with a number of not-for-profit customers, to ensure a deep understanding of the sector's needs.

The Outcome

TechnologyOne Financials and Enterprise Budgeting have assisted St Vincent de Paul Queensland in transforming its business to improve accuracy and achieve greater efficiencies. With enhanced budgeting processes and more accountable data, St Vincent de Paul Queensland has been able to improve transparency, save time and better allocate its resources.

"In this day and age, not-for-profit organisations need to be just as transparent and accountable as a corporate business, so it's crucial for us to have a system like TechnologyOne," says Chief Financial Officer, Deborah Nisbet.

"With TechnologyOne we've automated reporting and now have a 10 business day reporting cycle, which previously took 30 days."

"We've saved a considerable amount of time and cost, and accuracy has most definitely improved. But for us, it's not just about saving time, it's about better allocating resources. It lets us move from the 'do', to the 'review'."

Chief Financial Officer
St Vincent de Paul Society QLD

Not-for-profit organisations need to be just as transparent and accountable as a corporate business, so it's crucial for us to have a system like TechnologyOne's.

Customer's Perspective

St Vincent de Paul Society Queensland has more than 8,500 members and volunteers within its eight dioceses or regions. With 210 Conferences (local branches) in Queensland, St Vincent de Paul Queensland required an integrated system that could streamline budgeting and provide visibility across its multiple branches.

The Society's previous financial system provided limited reporting capabilities and was unable to cater for its unique business structure. St Vincent de Paul assessed the system's limitations and identified the need for change.

"We shortlisted a number of potential vendors when it was time to bring in a new system," said Chief Financial Officer Deborah Nisbet. "TechnologyOne was able to show us that they had the functionality.

"It was also reassuring that TechnologyOne had the capabilities to cater to not-for-profit providers. TechnologyOne has other customers in the industry, and it gave us a level of comfort that they could meet our needs."

Ms Nisbet said the flexibility of TechnologyOne's software allowed St Vincent de Paul to make immediate improvements to productivity and opened up opportunity for new projects and enhancements.

"We received about $26 million in emergency funding for the Brisbane floods just three months after implementing TechnologyOne. The flexible subledger capabilities within the system allowed us to distribute the funds with ease to those in need," she said.

"TechnologyOne coupled with our dedicated team, meant we were able to operate efficiently and effectively as an organisation."

Spotlight

Ms Nisbet said TechnologyOne's flexible and advanced reporting capabilities has allowed it to save time, by moving from a 30 day reporting cycle to just 10 business days.

"We've saved a lot of time using TechnologyOne. Every small change - even a journal entry - would take up to half an hour just to update the report. Then actually running the report itself would take forever," Ms Nisbet said.

"With TechnologyOne, we can now update and refresh reports instantly with the click of a button. To run the report, we don't have to do anything manually anymore.

"It's all automated, so we're not spending our time doing these reports, we're actually reviewing them and evaluating the data that comes out of it. We're looking for ways we can value-add and increase efficiencies, and that's the real value we've seen in moving to TechnologyOne."

Ms Nisbet said St Vincent de Paul Society Queensland has also enhanced the accuracy of its data, through a more streamlined reporting process.

"Our transparency has dramatically improved. Previously our reports couldn't be exported into a usable format, so we had to print out them out on paper and scan them in a PDF format to view them electronically. It was a nightmare!

"All reports we run within TechnologyOne are generated and exported directly from the system using XLOne. We don't have to manually check the content, because when you set a report up once and set it up right, you know the information it outputs is going to be accurate.

"Rather than being reactive to something that was maybe inaccurate, we're now being proactive and we can actually review what we've done."

About St Vincent de Paul Society Queensland

St Vincent de Paul Society has been operating in Queensland since 1894. More than 8,500 members and volunteers across Queensland assist people in need. In Queensland, there are 210 Conferences (local branches) within the eight dioceses, or regions.

The Society in Queensland supports more than 280,000 people and provides approximately $11 million in financial assistance to those in need. The members and volunteers are supported by some staff; however costs are kept to a minimum, meaning more money goes directly to those who are requiring the Society's assistance.

St Vincent de Paul Society Queensland website

Publish date

23 Feb 2015

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