The Organisation:

University of Queensland Union (UQU) is a not-for-profit organisation representing the interests of the students at the University of Queensland. They are dedicated to enriching the lives of students by providing a wide array of essential services, advocacy, and opportunities for personal and academic growth and support.

Their comprehensive suite of services includes legal advice, visa assistance, academic support, help with financial hardship, and social events. These services are offered free of charge, ensuring every student can thrive academically and personally.

The majority of UQU’s funding comes from two main sources: the university, with each student paying an administration fee, and from their own business ventures including cafes and bars.

UQU has approximately 50 full and part-time employees, increasing to 150 with casual staff, and are headquartered from St Lucia in Queensland.

The Need:

UQU faced several challenges with their existing reporting system, prompting the need for a comprehensive solution to address their requirements.

Initially, UQU had a functional system in place. However, the implementation of multi-factor authentication introduced unforeseen complications, such as issues with logging in and running reports. The organisation was also grappling with inefficiencies in report generation, a task that was a time-consuming manual process. This hindered productivity and posed limitations on the timeliness and accuracy of data analysis.

Opting for the former (finding a new solution), UQU embarked upon a journey to identify and implement a robust technology solution that could streamline operations, improve data accessibility, and empower the team to meet the evolving needs of the organisation.

The Solution:

Since partnering with Professional Advantage (PA) for their Dynamics 365 Business Central solution, both UQU and PA have worked to build a trusting and collaborative relationship. Therefore, it is no surprise that the solution to their budgeting and reporting needs came from PA.

“Immediately in our relationship with PA, we were happy, so when it came to looking at other solutions, we didn’t feel a need to look at any other partners.”

You can read more about the relationship between UQU and PA in their Client Story.

You can also discover why UQU chose to partner with PA for their Business Central support in this Client Story.

Solver is a corporate performance management (CPM) cloud-based solution that automates reporting, consolidations, budgeting, and forecasting processes. It integrates with Microsoft solutions—such as Business Central and Microsoft Dynamics GP—and a number of other financial systems.

Solver was initially introduced to UQU by PA in general conversation.

“Solver came up as a solution that PA were offering before we actually needed it. This meant that when we identified the need for a new reporting solution, we already had some knowledge about Solver and what it could do.”

Along with addressing the issues they had faced with their previous solution, UQU had a list of features that they wanted their new solution to have, which included:

• The ability to run real-time reports.
• Automating distribution.
• A ‘set and forget’ ability for reports, allowing them to schedule reports in advance.
• Faster reporting time.
• Support access and permissions at varying levels.
• Integration with Business Central.

“Solver’s integration with Business Central was a key reason for choosing it.”

The Results:

The implementation of Solver has led to significant improvements in operational efficiency, accuracy, and user satisfaction.

The streamlining or processes and the time savings have been particularly notable, including:

• The month-end report distribution process has reduced from 2 hours to half an hour.
• Three weeks has been saved on the end-of-year budget in comparison to previous years.
• Budgeting was previously done in Excel, resulting in multiple versions. In the transition to Solver, UQU have eliminated considerable administration maintenance time.
• Excel allows for human errors, which need locating and rectifying during the budgeting process. Solver budgeting has also eliminated this.
• Once a budget was complete, it would need to be converted to a Business Central readable format. Solver integrates with Business Central, removing this process.
• Daily reporting is now automated.

“Sometimes a task may not be that long on its own, but there is always the mental load of knowing it needs to be done, and this becomes more draining the more tasks there are. Solver has streamlined so many processes that this mental load is considerably reduced.”

Accuracy for the finance team has improved with Solver, as all data is pulled from the same source, ensuring a single source of truth. Previously there had been concerns about the finality of data; these concerns are now alleviated.

The ease of use of the new solution has meant that training of new users is a quick process—“It took less than half an hour to train managers”—and the user adoption has been widespread. This is further encouraged by the inbuilt features.

“Solver has a range of templates ready, so we don’t need to spend time creating them. It allows me to create reports to suit a variety of needs.”

The reaction to Solver has been overwhelmingly positive. Management quickly noticed improvements in visibility and ease of report generation, leading to increased transparency and information sharing. These improvements have been felt across the organisation, with the ability to facilitate easy creation and distribution of reports encouraging engagement.

“When you share more information, you get more questions. This shows that people are engaged with the system and interested in the organisation’s finances. It is indirectly encouraging people to understand the different facets of the organisation.”

Solver’s cloud-based nature has provided hidden advantages to the team, specifically allowing for remote accessibility.

“Knowing I can log on at any time, from anywhere, has allowed for a better work-life balance, removing the stress of needing to be in the office to action major tasks.”

This outlook aligns with a modern work structure of ‘work from anywhere’, ensuring people can be present for personal or family circumstances regardless of location.

Overall, the transition to Solver has been met with enthusiasm, with users appreciating its ease of use, transparency, flexibility, and efficiency.

“There has been such a good reaction to Solver. Everyone just likes it. It is so much easier than anything we experienced before.”

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