Depot America
Decreases Processing Times By 300%
Depot America is a national leader in the printer repair industry, assisting thousands of customers with parts sales, repair and advance exchange services. For the past 15 years, some of the world’s top manufacturers (OEMs), self-maintainers, and service providers have put their trust in Depot America products. Depot America services and provides parts for the major printer manufacturers including: Hewlett Packard, Canon, Lexmark, Okidata, Epson, Xerox and many more.
The Business Challenge
Depot America was outgrowing their Macintosh Accounting system quickly. Each morning, an import would run for “hours” that sent information from their custom service and repair system to their Macintosh based accounting system. Reports (such as Accounts Receivable aging) would have to be run overnight.
“The process of posting would take us up to 3 hours to complete. This was extremely time consuming and stressful.”
In 1996, Depot America produced about 500 invoices per day and had about 1,100 active customers. Unsatisfied with the support they were receiving from a former Great Plains solutions partner, they conducted an extensive search and chose eIS Business Solutions.
Things are much different at Depot America today. They have nearly tripled in transaction volume, employees, and space. With 3 Collections Managers on staff, they needed a way to accurately track conversations and tasks associated with the collection effort. Previously they kept track of all collection efforts manually.
After examining and rejecting a number of options as incomplete or too complex, Straus turned to Microsoft Business Solutions – Great Plains and eIS Business Solutions, a Certified Microsoft Business Solutions Partner.
eIS Business Solutions recommended Depot America move to an all PC platform. This was a big change for them at the time and represented new thinking. But the new platform promised rock solid performance, greater efficiency and an increase in productivity.
“Posting was an arduous task and down right scary. We would literally hold our breath each time we hit the post button.”
“System crashes were so prevalent; we needed to backup all of our files before every post, just in case.”
— Gail Straus, CPA, Vice President Finance at Depot America
The Solution
“eIS Business Solutions transferred our data from the Macintosh platform to our new PC Platform, smoothly and quickly. And the gains we made in productivity and efficiency were staggering.”
The Results
“Because of the suggestions and guidance provided by eIS Business Solutions, we have added additional features and functionality to our system. I feel like they (eIS) are an extension of my team, a true partner, always looking out for ways to save money and increase our efficiency. They don’t sell me what I don’t need.”
“eIS Business Solutions has been there for us throughout our growth. They have been supportive and responsive when we needed them most. We know we can count on them in a crunch. When we see our Solutions Consultant walk through the door, it’s like the cavalry has arrived.”
Since the initial move to Microsoft Business Solutions – Great Plains 7 years ago, Depot America has upgraded several times including a move to Microsoft SQL Server.
With their new fully integrated system in place for many years now, Gail Straus has seen measurable improvements on multiple fronts.
- Printing reports and posting are now completed within minutes and the fear of the system crashing during a post has all but vanished. With the proper tools in place, Depot America can recover from a system failure (a rare occurrence) in minutes rather than hours.
- Daily, there is a large volume of data to be moved into the Microsoft Business Solutions – Great Plains system. “This process of moving data and updating information used to take us hours, now it takes minutes. This alone was worth the move to the Microsoft Business Solutions – Great Plains on Microsoft SQL.”
- Collections have also become extremely streamlined. With the addition of Collections Management from Microsoft Business Solutions, Depot America has seen a dramatic reduction in Days Sales Outstanding (DSO) and a reduction in fraud.
Highlights
- Reduction in processing times: 300%
- Slashed 75% of time on import related tasks
- Reduction in Days Sales Outstanding (DSO) by 10 days, improving cash flow
- Reduction in fraudulent transactions
- Improved credit management
About eIS Business Solutions
Based in Red Bank, New Jersey, eIS Business Solutions is an established Microsoft Business Solutions Partner that helps businesses to leverage their existing business dollars to maximize productivity, efficiency, and increase revenues utilizing highly customizable business software and technology from leaders such as Best Software, IBM and Microsoft.
For more information on how eIS Business Solutions can help you enhance your business, contact Robert Smith at 732-708-0022.
Website: www.eisBusinessSolutions.com