NMSI
Incorporating the Science Museum, the National Museum
for Photography, Film and Television and the National Railway
Museum, NMSI needed a system capable of handling complex
requirements, the result of operating as two different legal
entities - NMSI, a charitable organisation and NMSI Trading
Company, a commercial entity.
As a government organisation, the Museums needed to follow a
rigorous selection procedure. Firstly, a tender was issued,
containing a very detailed statement of requirements. Out of the
nine responses received, three packages were short listed,
including Access Dimensions. These were evaluated on their ability
to meet both essential and desirable requirements, and on cost.
Many presentations were made in support of each bid and reference
sites were visited.
The reason for choosing Dimensions was clear. It met all of the
Museum's essential requirements, plus many of the desirable ones;
and it cost significantly less than the other two candidates.
Another deciding factor was the user friendliness of the Access
system, as Paul Flewellen, Senior Management Accountant, explains
"We involved our users in the selection process. Everyone was
struck by the strong impact of the Dimensions screens. We received
positive feedback immediately. It was unanimously agreed that
Dimensions was not only more user friendly than the existing accounting system,
but also than the other systems being evaluated."
Securing information
Detailed security profiles for 500 user identities guarantee a
secure environment for holding information, by strictly governing
which parts of the system can be used by which members of staff.
Sales ledger clerks have access to the sales ledger; likewise
purchase ledger access has been given to purchase ledger clerks.
Wider permissions are granted as necessary for other members of the
organisation, such as the management or financial accounts team
members.
"It was unanimously agreed that Dimensions was not only
more user friendly than the existing accounting system, but also
than the other systems being evaluated." Paul
Flewellen
Senior Management Accountant
Non-finance users also have access to the system. They can raise
their own purchase orders and sales orders, eliminating delays and
reducing the workload on the finance team. In addition, they can
draw off their own reports when required. This is of particular
importance when monitoring the financial performance of individual
cost centres or projects.
Cost accounting for a diverse range of projects
With the Museum undertaking a large number and wide variety of
projects, the flexibility of the Access costing module has been a
major gain for Paul and his teams. This can be illustrated by
looking at three very different projects.
The first is the construction of a new Railway Museum at
Shildon, a £10M project that is being undertaken in
conjunction with the local authority.
The Access system is set up to consolidate all costs against one
major project record. Up to 30 sub-projects, each with their own
records, feed information into this top level (where sort keys are
used to reflect the sub-project codes).
This structure enables Paul to conduct sophisticated cost reporting. He says, "The
main advantage is the ease in which accurate costing reports can be
produced. Now we can quickly identify our actuals versus budgeted.
Non-financial managers, many of whom frequently need project
information, can also run reports at any time and get all the
information they need."
The second example is the 'Science Nights' project.
Periodically, the Science Museum opens its doors at night, for
children to sleep over. The costing module is used to monitor the
income raised at such events and to allocate specific costs against
them.
Finally, the Museum also conducts activities that depend heavily
upon sponsorship. For example, charitable donations are currently
being used to fund upgrades to the museum's galleries. The costing
module tracks the expenditure made against these donations -
something that is essential when dealing with restricted
funding.
Tightening purchasing controls
Across all of the museums operations, around 3,600 purchase
orders are raised each month. The Access Purchase Order Processing
and Invoice Register modules have made a significant impact on the
Museum's purchasing culture. Prior to Access, all purchasing was
done manually. Paul explains, "In the past, the majority of orders
were only put onto the system once the invoice had been received.
Now orders are raised at the time of purchasing. This has
immediately tightened our purchasing controls."
The Invoice Register module is helping to tighten these controls
even further, by clarifying which invoices relate to which purchase
orders, and highlighting orders that have yet to be fulfilled.
"Invoice Register helps us to control invoices in a proper
manner," says Paul. "This has streamlined processing work for our
purchase ledger clerks, as we are no longer backtracking or making
late adjustments. As we expand our use of the system we will also
take advantage of the authorisation and approval procedures. We are
certainly hopeful that this will further reduce our costs."
Eliminating mundane tasks
At NMSI, sales orders are raised for a wide range of reasons -
corporate hire activities through the commercial operation,
educational programs for schools, and for the collection of
sponsorship money from corporate donors. Inevitably, this means a
number of different departments are involved in the process.
The old system required each department to fill in a "sales
invoice requisition" form. This was forwarded to the Sales Ledger
department for the invoice to be raised. Now, with Access Sales Order
Processing, each department goes directly into the accounts
system to raise its own sales orders (and insert its own comments).
Paul says, "Because of this module, the Sales Ledger department no
longer needs to key in details held on hand- written forms. This
has reduced errors, increased our efficiency and given ledger staff
more time to concentrate on other tasks."
Improving credit control
With the Access Credit Control module, NMSI now has consolidated
credit and debt control. "With an integrated system we can choose
how we organise our credit control activities," explains Paul. "We
can chase total debt from the centre or from individual locations.
Chase letters can be raised quickly, without having to re-key any
account information. Before Access we had three separate sales
ledgers, making our operations fragmented and disorganised. The
same customer could be chased by different sites without the others
even knowing it."
Having just implemented credit control, the essentials
are up, running and working effectively. NMSI is now working on
developing routines that make the most of the facilities offered by
Dimensions.
Meeting government requirements Careful design of the chart of
accounts and use of user defined keys, along with a variety of
crystal reports, enable the NMSI to produce statutory accounts
which meet government, charity and company accounting
requirements.
This structured approach to software selection will help you determine which solution best meets your needs. Covering everything from research to implementation, this useful guide also provides detailed coverage of service-specific functionality, such as meter billing & contract management tools, PDA integration and more.
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