Safety Management Group

Ogle talked to SMG’s long-time technology partner Somerset Cloud ERP about the company’s needs to support its rapid growth and unique business requirements. “My demand list was pretty set, and not a lot of competitors could get on the list,” Ogle says, adding that there weren’t a lot of true-cloud platforms. “In the end, we really had just two options: Sage Intacct and Acumatica.” Once Somerset Cloud ERP demoed Acumatica and explained the growth-friendly pricing model and ability to seamlessly integrate with third-party applications, it became evident that was the best choice, she says.

Affordable ERP

“I think one of the reasons we stayed where we were for so long is that when you start looking at integrated software, it’s very expensive,” Ogle says. “But Acumatica is very modern and progressive and has a very different pricing model than all the other software we looked at. I loved the transaction-based pricing.”

Acumatica’s full-function mobile app was also attractive; it would give the remote field service team working from 37 states much better access to a single source of truth and give managers greater visibility and the tools necessary to manage their projects.

In partnership with Jason Leveson of Somerset Cloud ERP leading the implementation, “Project 7 to 1” was launched. Ogle said her biggest worry during implementation was “bringing enough data over to adequately mothball all seven systems while also limiting any disruption to our associates.” SMG switched over its accounting department (invoicing, GL, AP, bank reconciliations, etc.) and time tracking first. They staged the switch for expenses from Concur over a one-month period. Then dashboards, CRM and third-party integrations were scheduled for post “go-live” dates.

More efficient, more cost effective

SMG’s accounting team and CFO now focus on strategic business initiatives while the executive team has much deeper insight into the business with the level of accuracy required to make decisions for a growing midmarket company. “To now be able to see downtime for an associate, who may be underutilized, or which accounts have bills coming due or how we are doing from cash perspective with the push of a button is exciting to me,” says Gieseking.

Ogle estimates Acumatica’s dashboards and the ability to operate from a single source of data freed up some 12 weeks of her time a year. She no longer spends hours creating executive financial reports, trying to close out time and expense reporting or hours trying to reconcile everything for month end. The data is all in one place and readily available in Acumatica.

“The time system can now be locked down, financial modules can be closed and controlled, and Acumatica allows me an extra week every month that I can work on projects or initiatives,” says Ogle ticking off Acumatica’s benefits. “It also helped from a cost perspective.”

That’s because consolidating time and expense reporting into a single source of data saved the 5-person accounting staff several hours and allowed them to avoid hiring an additional person. Because the mobile workforce uploads time and expense information directly into Acumatica, the payroll person cut the time it takes to run payroll from some 40 hours to 10.

Part of that reduction happened because Acumatica easily connects to third party applications including Paylocity, which the company uses for payroll. Somerset Cloud ERP initiated customizations that now makes processing payroll a breeze. “She has been able to take on other projects and help me with a new compliance division while also resuming a part time schedule,” Ogle says. “That’s huge.”

Mobile workforce now has real-time insight

In using the Acumatica mobile app, the field services team have business capabilities they have not had before. SMG managers log in and “see what they need to at level of detail they never had before across all the points of a project that are important,” Ogle says. They now see data such as invoices that need approval, employee billable hours, and if clients have paid a bill. Previously, with SAP Concur, which was escalating in cost, they could approve time and expenses but there was no visibility into projects. “The visibility has increased 10-fold,” she says.

“Acumatica also allows us to have a bid tool that’s consistent, so all managers bidding work can estimate work correctly,” Gieseking adds. Before, they relied on a locked spreadsheet that wasn’t updated often, and some bids were made using old information. “We had used Salesforce but mothballed it because it was difficult to maintain the separate system,” Ogle explains. “The ability to have everything in one place is a huge benefit with Acumatica.”

Easy transition to work from home

When the Pandemic hit, SMG’s headquarters staff shifted from its Indianapolis based office to working from home, virtually overnight. Because of Acumatica’s cloud-based platform, the shift was “miraculously easy,” says Ogle. “In a day’s time we confirmed everyone had what they needed, they took their office work home that night, and started working from home the next day.”

“I couldn’t fathom that we could’ve picked up in a day and be remote without Acumatica,” she says. “I shudder to think about the amount of time and coordination it would have taken with our prior system.”

Poised for continued growth with a connected business

Despite the uncertainties surrounding the Covid-19 crisis, Safety Management Group is anticipating continued growth and can make better decisions based on real-time data. They easily on-boarded some 50 associates since the company’s original go-live.

Acumatica has also allowed SMG to avoid expensive software seat licenses which across its previous seven systems had climbed to more than $50,000 from just $7,000 several years ago.

“Acumatica definitely positions us for growth,” Gieseking says. “The way we were doing things was outdated and it wasn’t allowing us to operate in the most efficient and cost-effective manner. Acumatica better aligns with our growth path & ever evolving business needs.”