Swan Housing Group has reported that its implementation of a purchase-to-pay procurement system from Soprano Solutions had resulted in a 40 per cent increase in the number of invoices being processed without any increase in finance staff.
The Soprano system delivers real-time and online budget management and commitment reporting to allow Swan Housing’s budget holders and its central finance team to monitor and control expenditure across the organisation. The functionality of the system also ensures that all suppliers comply with Swan Housing’s standards in terms of accreditations, values and ethos while providing the opportunity to achieve better rates with key partners.
Swan Housing’s two finance clerks now deal with 14,000 invoices each year, up from 10,000 when Soprano was originally implemented several years ago. During the same time, Soprano has also helped rationalise the number of suppliers used by Swan Housing by almost 60 per cent from more than 1,700 to just 700.
Michael Rutherford, director of financial services, Swan Housing Group, said, “We chose Soprano because it was prepared to work in partnership with us to develop a system in line with our exact requirements. The system not only offered excellent value for money but was also simpler to use and more flexible compared with alternative systems.”