The University of Nottingham Students’ Union (UoNSU or the Union), a student-led organisation and independent charity, is to cut administration time and costs by 15 per cent with a financial management system and mobile expenses app from Advanced Exchequer (Exchequer). The organisation is expected to go-live with the software in January 2015.
Exchequer’s mobile expenses app will automate the processing of 20,000 student expense claims each year. The leading software provider’s integrated finance system will also enable staff to streamline manual reporting procedures and assist UoNSU’s 300 societies and clubs to effectively manage a combined annual budget of several million pounds.
Maria Brown, Finance Manager at The University of Nottingham Students’ Union, says: “Our previous system was restrictive and cumbersome for staff required to produce comprehensive management reports and plan for changing financial commitments and statutory reporting requirements.
“Exchequer’s intuitive charitable reporting capabilities, the richness of data it provides and the ease of use – for non-finance professionals – eclipsed the six other systems we considered.”
Exchequer’s mobile app will provide a faster, more efficient way to process expenses. Students will be able to electronically submit their claims using smartphone and tablet devices, attaching supporting documents such as receipts to facilitate approval, 24 hours a day. Expenses are automatically routed to the relevant authoriser and students can use the app to monitor the approval status alongside their claims history.
The finance solution will provide a consistent view of accounts for each society and club and will increase overall financial visibility and transparency across the organisation. This will make it easier for the charity to comply with evolving statutory reporting requirements, such as Statement of Recommended Practice (Sorps).
Exchequer’s integrated project job and time costing module will also enable managers to easily self-serve by extracting real-time financial information into Excel. As a result, managers will be able to analyse current spend instantly, which will improve budgetary control and replace the need to collate, print and post financial reports.
Furthermore, Exchequer will interface with UoNSU’s electronic point-of-sale (ePOS) system, Fidelity, to provide advanced reporting insight into the revenue performance of the Union’s campus shops.
Brown comments: “Exchequer’s solutions will transform the efficiency of the finance department by automating manual-based procedures. The mobile app will reduce the time and cost to process student expense claims by 15 per cent while reducing queries and delays incurred when paper copies are lost or misplaced.
“Giving Union managers the ability to easily self-serve and track every aspect of their budgetary spend will assist them to maintain tighter control, freeing us up to prepare detailed and reliable financial analyses. Having a consolidated view of expenditures across our clubs and societies will improve decision making dramatically.”
Exchequer is part of Advanced Business Solutions, an Advanced Computer Software Group company.
