Eide Bailly

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m one of three owners of a prosthodontic dentistry office in Newport Beach, California. We employ about 30 people.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Eide Bailly?

We’ve been working with one of their accountants for the last 20+ years.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Eide Bailly is managing all our accounting. We have an in-house bookkeeper, but we give all of our QuickBooks and other numbers to Eide Bailly. They make sure that everything is crosschecked and in order. Their team also prepares our tax returns and K-1 partnership returns.

They come in at least twice a year to make sure we’re on target with our budget goals, check whether we need to modify our spending and provide financial advice.

Eide Bailly has researched a special tax grant and informed us about what information we needed to provide in order to apply for it. We’ve had numerous conference calls and webinars during COVID-19 to walk through the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) application. They walked us through what we’d need to manage the grant once we got it.

What is the team composition?

We’ve been working with Art (CPA & Senior Manager) since before he became a part of Eide Bailly one year ago. He’s brought on two people from Eide Bailly to work with us. We send our QuickBooks ledger to them. He has other advisors in place, who’ve helped with research.

How did you come to work with Eide Bailly?

The practice had Art in place when I joined in 2002. Then, Art joined Eide Bailly.

How much have you invested with them?

The cost of Eide Bailly’s services so far is $50,000–$70,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our ongoing engagement started around June 2019. We’ve been working with Eide Bailly for about a year and a half.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

I’ve talked to colleagues who needed consultation from their accountants about the recent COVID-19 grants, and they were told to look it up on the internet. When it comes to our accountant and Eide Bailly, they put out webinars and newsletters and hold conference calls with us. They’re proactive in educating us on what is available.

They also have an in-house link to the American Dental Association (ADA) so they learn about things as they’re coming up and are able to act quickly. If there are any questions, they can go to that contact to find answers.

How did Eide Bailly perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re excellent.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They have a lot of expertise, not just in financials but also in regulatory aspects. Eide Bailly was able to answer questions about how we could apply for COVID-19 grants and how we could spend the money and document it so the loan would be forgiven. Art tapped into several experts at Eide Bailly and facilitated calls and emails with us, or he got the information himself and got back to us.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, nothing comes to mind. There have been some crunch times to meet IRS deadlines and applications, but Eide Bailly always gets back to us promptly.

BACKGROUND

Could you provide a brief description of your company?

We are a manufacturer of polyethylene bags, feeding and tubing. We’re essentially a recipe-based, custom manufacturer of plastic bags, plastic tubing, flexible packaging and the like. We have roughly 23 employees and we work 24 hours a day, 5 days a week. I work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

What is your position?

I’m the owner.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What were your business goals for initiating the project with Accounting Systems, Inc. (ASI)?

Initially, prior to working with ASI, we had a manual filing system. We had manual order, typing, write-up, and production schedules. We had to recreate all of our forms as many as six or seven times, and our goal was to put them into a program or a system that would eliminate most of error. Taking those six or seven entries and typing in them once and letting them roll through the system from the initial sales order to the production orders, to the bookkeeping to the accounting, all that sort of stuff. We only had to do it once. Making things correct once is easy; recreating it six times by hand with different people makes it very difficult. That was our primary goal when we began to talk with ASI.

SOLUTION

How did you select the Sage software as your preferred solution?

We initially began with obtaining a server on premises. We had talked to the company that was providing us with our computers and the server, and they recommend a company and solution that would do what it was we wanted. They ended up recommending ASI and the Sage platform for our particular needs and requirements.

Did they recommend alternatives or was it exclusively Sage?

No, there were two or three other options and they didn’t pan out very well. They weren’t very flexible. Once you bought the program, there really wasn’t any way to add to them if you wanted to. The great thing about Sage is its modular form. You can add or subtract or modify it any way that you want to. It’s an extremely flexible solution and we saw great value in that.

Did you conduct any research of your own in order to identify potential partners for the implementation?

I talked to several of our existing customers that we work with closely. There were other folks that had worked with Sage, that have Sage, that need updating. They’ve had it for quite some time. It has worked extremely well for them. The ASI group came very, very highly recommended from several of our loyal customers.

In terms of the project itself, could you describe the scope of the project, the kind of components that were included, such as design, development, support, etc?

Considering we started with a manual program, everything was fairly new and fresh to us. I’m not a technical expert. ASI was extremely helpful to work with as far as being patient, coming in and doing a whole survey as far as exactly what we had, what we had to have, and what we needed. We began to modify the existing Sage solution to accommodate our very, very particular needs.

The first thing was starting with our inventory, the item maintenance and history, creating our production sheets, our sales orders, etc. We had to replicate their formatting so we didn’t have to worry about re-training my entire staff. It took a couple of months to do that and to work the little bugs out of those programs. They operated at the speed in which I was comfortable with. Since I wasn’t a technical expert, it took me a little bit longer to go through. I generated full scenarios of what could or couldn’t go wrong, what would or wouldn’t go wrong, until I thought I had all the bugs worked out. At that point we began working towards implementing the entire Sage system into our business process.  

It was quite a long process, but it took us, from when we initially saw the program to until we actually started working with it, about a year. Once we began working with it and modifying it, it took another six months before we actually implemented it the entire organization.

Could you provide a sense of the size of the initiative, either in monetary terms or in the total personnel that was dedicated to the project?

The total personnel from our side included only myself. I personally went through all of the scenarios because I know everyone’s responsibility. I didn’t require internal expertise since I’m extremely familiar with the entire business process, from start to finish. The development team on the ASI side was typically 3-4 consultants, working on and off depending on the technical requirements. They were extremely insightful and walked me through the entire process before the actual implementation. The ongoing support has been extremely great as well.

In monetary terms, we invested approximately $35,000 into it, which was certainly worth it.

When was this project was completed?

From the time we began working on it in November of 2011, we actually completed the implementation on June 15 of 2012. We’ve had ongoing support and maintenance since that point.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

In terms of the project results, could you share any statistics or metrics that demonstrate the quality of work delivered?

There really aren’t any hard objective measures to share. I’d say the error factor has dropped between 85 and 95 percent since the full implementation. The project really streamlined our workflow process. My employees have been impressed by the new system, too. It was a difficult transition to begin with, but since we dedicated a lot of effort into making the formatting similar, the overall switchover was relatively painless. Everyone is able to utilize the new system at this point.

In terms of project feedback, how do you think that ASI performed?

Considering they went at the speed in which I needed, I think everything was met exactly the way I needed it to be. They’ve been extremely accommodating.

In terms of comparing ASI to their competitors, is there anything in particular that you noticed about ASI that sets them apart from their counterparts?

No, I really don’t have anything to compare it to. They’re really the first extraneous IT service provider that I’ve worked with, and they did a fantastic job.

In retrospect, are there any areas that you feel ASI could improve upon or that you as a client would have done differently in approaching this type of project?

Not that I can think of. From my standpoint, it went exactly the way I wanted it to. From their standpoint, it would probably have been a little easier on their end if there were an IT person in-house spearheading the process. They were very patient with us. I suspect they could have completed the project in a fraction of the time had we some experience with this sort of thing and/or if we had dedicated IT personnel.

BACKGROUND

Could you provide a brief description of your company?

We sell specialty tools for the automotive industry, and we employ 13, maybe 14 people.

What is your position?

I’m one of the owners, along with my sister.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What were your company’s business goals for the projects that you undertook with Accounting Systems?

Usually, where we need their help is with taking certain customers out of our database, certain tools out of the inventory, and printing them out on Excel or the software. We sometime need to add a field to something unique to us that really doesn’t come out of a can on any software program for business. So, when we have to add a field or add a check box, they do that.

SOLUTION

Do you have any specific reasons why you chose Sage rather than its competitors?

Back when we bought it, which goes back about seven years now, it just seemed like the most logical, straightforward platform to us. I believe we talked to a few people that had it, and they gave us good reviews.

Would you briefly describe the process for actually selecting Accounting Systems to work with?

Well, how that came about is when we originally bought Sage, it was through a company called Prosoft. I’m not sure if that’s what it was because that was seven years ago, and we were only with them for about a year or two. They just didn’t have enough manpower to cover what we needed. So, we transitioned  to ASI. I believe somebody may have told me about them. They had Sage, they used ASI, and they gave them a great review. I then contacted them, introduced our company, described our needs, and it basically went from there.

In terms of the projects that you’ve worked with specifically with ASI, can you describe the scope of the projects?

It’s essentially development and support. The only time that design would come in is if we printed out, in which case the invoice and the logo has to be moved, and size of the character font has to be increased. That’s the only thing that required any design work. The rest of it would be if we wanted to have an automatic program where we can go into a customer’s file, check a box, and then at the end of the month, go and take all those customers that have that box checked and dump it into an Excel file, and then have catalogs mailed out to them. That’s something that required custom development work from ASI.

In terms of this project, did you have development capabilities in-house, or were these responsibilities delegated to ASI?

Marty [the IT manager at ASI] can do certain things he’s familiar with. So we do kind of work with ASI, but if it’s something that demands ground up work, doesn’t exist in the Sage software and has to be created, then ASI will do it.

If possible, could you provide a sense of the size of the initiatives you undertook either in monetary terms or in the personnel dedicated to the project itself?

It’s usually not a huge task. Typically, one person at ASI can handle what we need. I might say a really big project would be five or six hours. Doing something minor for us could just take an hour or two. I haven’t had projects that I had to put ASI where they’ve had to dedicate anything near a block of 20 hours to doing something.

There are no projects currently in progress, correct?

There are no projects currently in progress. I think the last one they helped us with was locating a number of customers in our database that we wanted to send our new catalog to. It might have taken two hours. That was completed about a month ago.

How many projects have you worked on with ASI?

Since we’ve been working with them? I think we’ve been with them now for five years. We probably average 10 projects a year. They’re all relatively small. It might be an hour project. Like I said, the max could have been a six-hour project.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

In terms of results, could you share statistics or metrics that demonstrate the effectiveness of the work they've delivered to you?

The catalog mailing, as simple as it sounds, that doesn’t exist in Sage. I didn’t have that feature. I’d probably have to put every customer request for a catalogue manually into an Excel database. The ability to simply check a box and have Sage collect all those customers in the database, and then spit them out in an Excel file, that’s a big deal for us.

Do you have any feedback from internal or external users? 

Yes, definitely. Marty enjoys working with them. It makes his job much easier.

Overall, how do you think that ASI performed on the projects they’ve worked with you.

Very well.

In terms of comparing them to other partners that you’ve worked with, is there anything special or unique about ASI, and the services they provide?

What was the better with ASI than the predecessor is they are available in a more timely fashion. Like with building a special, I think it’s done through what they call a visual integrator, building a program that we don’t need to have done that day at some point. Of course, they’re not under any pressure to get that done. Now, it’s a combination of things: We know how to use mass better, and we understand how ASI works. Everything has run smoother with ASI.

What I’m getting at is when we first started out with ASI, and we had a glitch, sometimes it would affect us trying to finish out the day, and then we had to get somebody on the phone sooner rather than later. They’re great with communication. Being responsive and accessible is of great importance to us. Back when we had those problems, we’d do our end of day UPS picks up here at 3:30 p.m. If we had a problem emerge at 1:30 p.m. that kept us from going any further, they were good about getting on the problem, and fixing it immediately, thus allowing us to continue processing orders.

In retrospect, are there any areas you think ASI could improve upon in their service provision, or perhaps areas where, as a client, you would do something differently in approaching these projects?

No. Not so much of that. I think we’ve done two upgrades with them. The second one went smoother when we went from mass. I can’t really think of anything. I would say, if they take on more clients, I hope they maintain the same level of quality in their work. There is no evidence that that has happened, that there’s been a step back in quality so far, but I hope that as they gain clients. They still have enough time to handle the ones they’ve had for some time.