Dewsbury College

Dewsbury College is a community college, serving the North Kirklees region of West Yorkshire. Through its Batley School of Art and Design, the college also acts as a national resource for the delivery and development of design education. The institution and its staff are committed to raising the participation and achievement levels of local young people, as well as offering relevant and innovative programs to adult learners.

The Finance team, which is responsible for running the daily finances of the college, delivers information to the Finance and Resources Committee. This information is used to make recommendations to the Corporation regarding annual estimates of income and expenditure, major variations of expenditure and capital expenditure requirements.

This process relies heavily upon the reporting abilities of the college’s financial system. Until recently, the college used a Platinum accounting solution. But, with Platinum proving increasingly unsatisfactory, the decision was made to source an alternative system. By August 2003, the Finance department had implemented an Access Accounts Dimensions solution (centred upon Microsoft’s SQL Server database).

Access was chosen because of its highly flexible accounts structure and its ability to meet all of the college’s reporting requirements. Kai Moorhead, Finance Officer (Management Accounts), confirms, “Not only has Access Dimensions improved our reporting, but it is more user friendly than our previous system.”

Improved Reporting and Cost Controls

Dewsbury College has taken full advantage of the 8 nominal categories that Dimensions offers, building a chart of accounts that caters to its precise departmental reporting needs. Every budget holder has a cost centre code within the nominal, helping to monitor and control departmental costs for categories such as Finance and Management Information, Academic and Adult Education.

Kai Moorhad says, “This flexibility has enabled us to set up nominal codes that relate to specific departments and are instantly identifiable. With our old system, we had to use an almost meaningless 15-digit nominal code. Access is much clearer – it delivers information in a format that is easy for our budget holders to understand, which is particularly important for our non-finance users. And this helps us to control costs.”

The Access costing module is used to manage actual costs and budgets for individual college projects, academic areas and departments. Reports can be run quickly at any time, showing cost centre level detail. Monthly budget holder reports are produced, along with senior management summary reports, showing both budgeted and actual costs. This has improved the flow of information around the organization, further strengthening cost management.

The college also produces standard reports from the Access system, including Profit & Loss and Balance Sheet. A detailed Trial Balance report is used to analyse each nominal code, featuring detailed opening and closing balances for both debits and credits. Aged creditor and debtor reports are produced quickly and available for analysis at any time.

Future Plans

Dewsbury College is already seeing the benefits of Access Accounts and has firm plans to build on this success. A new team member will be recruited and trained to tackle overdue payments, using the Access Credit Control module. And the Access Purchase Order Processing Module will soon be introduced, adding a new layer to the procurement process and bringing even greater control over expenditure.