Acumatica Streamlines International Non-Profit's Financial Data Management

CASE STUDY

Acumatica streamlines CASE (Council for Advancement and international non-profit’s Support of Education) www.case.org financial data management

COMPANY “[Acumatica is] extremely reliable—a platform • Location: HQ in Washington, D.C., plus offices in London, that is up and running 24/7 around the world. Singapore and Mexico City. It’s accessible to everyone, any time they need it; • Industry: I nternational membership organization there’s nothing from an Information System serving colleges perspective that is stopping us.” and universities, independent and international schools, - Adam Rosenbaum, Director of Information Systems, CASE and other non-profit organizations SITUATION QuickBooks since they started as an OVERVIEW CASE, the Council for Advancement and offshoot of that office. It had become a very Founded in 1974; opened London Support of Education, is an international disjointed operation.” office in 1994 and has continued non-profit organization with about CASE considered sticking with Dynamics to grow globally. In 2013, the 100 employees at its headquarters in SL, or switching to SAP or Intaact. SAP organization switched from Washington, D.C. and offices in London, wasn’t considered for long, due to the cost. Microsoft Dynamics SL (formerly Singapore and Mexico City. Its operating As for Dynamics SL, Rosenbaum says they Solomon) and QuickBooks to revenues exceed $20 million. felt it was going to be difficult to manage Acumatica, improving financial internationally , essentially forcing the other reporting and enhancing With membership including more than offices to work with what headquarters productivity. 3,600 education-related institutions in 76 countries, CASE offers professional was using. Regarding Intaact, Rosenbaum says, “It was very Solomon-esque, which KEY RESULTS development, training, networking and other resources for nearly 70,000 appealed to Finance staff, but it was pretty • Improved productivity through communications, alumni relations, much ‘take our terms.’ ” an integrated, cloud-based marketing and fundraising staff, as well system SOLUTION • Significant savings of time and as leaders of the member institutions. effort in monthly closing of Rosenbaum says after CASE received a CASE’s Director of Information Systems, books recommendation to look at Acumatica, Adam Rosenbaum, says, “As an • Stronger financial reporting they did their due diligence and on an international basis, with international organization, we operate ultimately decided to buy Acumatica. multiple currencies in multiple currencies and have multiple Rosenbaum reports, “We were attracted • Four separate offices operate boards to report to. With our old system, by the flexibility of the financing and independently but have we had no interaction at all—the systems by Acumatica’s unlimited user licensing connected systems certainly did not talk.” model—whether we chose to host it • 24/7 support for all offices, in ourselves or be on their Cloud, we could U.S. and international Rosenbaum explains, “At headquarters, we were on the Dynamics SL 7.0 platform; the Singapore office was using QuickBooks’ Asia-Pacific version; in London, they used QuickBooks’ European version. Mexico was sort of jammed into the European

always have a fixed price.” He notes that the Financial Suite met their initial needs and they decided to add Fixed Assets later.

CASE’s Information Systems Director also appreciated the opportunity to have ... we do financial transactions in “a single platform to manage all of our international regional offices, and the “eight different currencies throughout ability to eliminate all the third-party software those offices were using.” the world. Multi-currency support was Rosenbaum adds that CASE had another an absolutely critical feature for us reason to choose Acumatica: ongoing support. “One of our concerns was 24/7 that not all ERP vendors could deliver.” support. We say the sun never really sets on CASE—someone is always staffing Adam Rosenbaum, Director of Information Systems, CASE something.”

BENEFITS On the same day CASE launched Acumatica they also launched a new Membership Management System to handle the Another benefit their CFO appreciates, As for the future, Rosenbaum says, “We Accounts Receivable functionality. Thanks Rosenbaum says, is the transparency of the are currently going through a strategic to Acumatica, Rosenbaum reports, “It’s now data; they can allow any user access to the planning process for the next few years, and all in one big efficient system, as opposed system and the reports they might need: I believe that the information coming out of to many different ones. So now all the “We have good reporting now, in terms Acumatica is certainly going to help steer money is flowing into Accounts Receivable of where am I vs. my budget.” In the past, that discussion.” and meanwhile, all of the Accounts Payable he says, getting this information required With Acumatica, Rosenbaum says, “We is happening around the world.” constant emails between program directors feel very comfortable that the software and accounting staff. Rosenbaum adds, He adds, “There’s no more question now can support what we want it to do. It’s “The ability for all end-users to have access as to who wrote a check for what.” In fact, extremely reliable—a platform that is up is great—from an Information System he says, “They’ve eliminated check-writing and running 24/7 around the world. It’s management perspective, it’s almost like in the UK now. Funds are just distributed accessible to everyone, any time they need my work is done, which I could not be electronically from Acumatica directly to it; there’s nothing from an Information happier about.” the bank, and the bank takes care of the System perspective that is stopping us. rest. This is very helpful.” Rosenbaum also reports, “We’ve eliminated Because the sun never sets on CASE, the at least two weeks off of our monthly sun can never set on CASE systems.” With Acumatica, Rosenbaum says, “The close, if not more.” Acumatica has allowed other big benefit is consistency and data them to skip most steps they used to need: integrity, and the ability to consolidate “We’ve streamlined it. We can close the all of these regional currencies into one books for a month usually in the first week world view, which is our United States of the next month. That is a huge benefit in dollar view—even though we do financial terms of time, effort, and information that is transactions in eight different currencies now available.” throughout the world. Multi-currency support was an absolutely critical feature for us that not all ERP vendors could deliver.”