Landscaping Company
"With Strategic Financials' recommendations and guidance, we were able to implement new processes and procedures to improve the accuracy and speed of our financial reporting-ensuring a smooth transition to open book management, and, ultimately driving our profits higher."
-Rick Hanson, COO of Serpico Landscaping Inc.
Project |
Before |
After |
Financial Reports |
21 Days after close |
3 days after close |
Month-end Close |
21 Days after month end |
3 days after month end |
Year-end Close |
6 weeks after year end |
1 week after year end |
Payroll Reports |
3 weeks |
20 minutes |
Financial System Cost |
$210K |
$160K |
Strategic Analysis:
When Serpico Landscaping-a midsize commercial landscaping maintenance company in Fremont, California-decided to embark on an aggressive growth plan based on open book management, they needed an entirely new financial strategy that would enable highly accurate, weekly tracking of numerous key performance variables.
With 135 employees and more than 300 service contracts in the San Francisco Bay Area alone, Serpico knew that its existing financial systems wouldn't make the grade. In addition to requiring a three-week close at the end of each month, costs varied widely month to month for no apparent reason.
Their answer-turn to the expert, Strategic Financials-to help them a chieve their aggressive goals. The first step was an intensive operational audit designed to assess performance and identify problem areas.
Solutions:
After a comprehensive analysis of the audit findings, strategic recommendations were made to help Serpico save both time and money throughout their financial operations. This included developing new procedures and then training personnel in these known best practices. It also involved installing real-time, web-based financial software to automate invoice generation, track and import all expense data and pay vendors electronically.
The company also transitioned a number of other daily operations from manual to automated systems. All time tracking, for example, was moved to electronic time clocks. In this case, employees were given magnetic ID cards that could be swiped through an electronic reader. A new payroll service was also implemented to enable electronic data transfer and automate paycheck generation. Other specific changes included:
Activity |
Before |
After |
Timecards |
Manual punch cards |
Electronic swipe cards |
Payroll |
Manual data entry to upload information for 135 employees to payroll service |
Automatic upload and file transfer to payroll service |
Payroll Reports |
Hard copy manually executed and entered into general ledger |
Delivered electronically-automatically extracted and imported to general ledger |
Payroll Checks |
Hard copy, mailed |
Electronic direct deposit |
Monthly Invoices |
Printed and mailed |
Direct computer faxed |
AP |
Weekly manual checks |
Weekly electronic checks |
Budgeting: |
Non-existent |
Weekly electronic forecasts/tracking |
Results:
The result is an organization that now delivers on time reporting every week, with less work and fewer people required. Serpico now closes its books in days instead of weeks; with performance measures not only used regularly, but also trusted implicitly by all the company's employees. These changes were instrumental in enabling the company's shift to open book management. More importantly, they have helped the company achieve record growth and profitability-with year-to-date results consistently exceeding the aggressive plan.
