Nelmac Kūmānu upgraded their Financial Management system with integrations across other existing software, to deliver seamless workflow management, data sharing with clients, and billing processes, as well as making sure time and inventory is tracked accurately across the organisation.

The Situation

Nelmac Kūmānu is an environmental asset management service contractor working across the top of the South Island in New Zealand. 

Their starting point with Seamless, as it is for many clients, was needing a GIS integration and reporting solution. The team was also invested in working smarter across the business. “We’re keen to stay on top of technology trends and be an industry leader — whether that’s for our internal systems or externally, using state-of-the-art drone technology in our conservation projects,” says Nic Stuart, Nelmac Kūmānu’s Technology Business Partner.

Nelmac Kūmānu then looked to replace their Financial Management Information System with Microsoft Business Central, which required integration with their HR, Field Mobility and Client systems. Seamless was brought on board to connect up these systems and liaise with Nelmac Kūmānu’s Business Central Implementation Partner. 

Outcomes for Nelmac Kūmānu

Technology and implementation partnership

Seamless was involved from the beginning of this journey, translating Nelmac Kūmānu’s needs to the Implementation Partner’s technical team. This required a strategic vision of the whole organisation and how existing, complex systems could be improved on with minimal disruptions.

“Seamless became almost a part of our team for that process,” says Charmaine Bianchi, Senior Business Analyst at Nelmac Kūmānu. “They were attending the meetings with us and explaining our needs, because they know our business really well.”

The challenge was to replicate their existing processes and improve on them, with minimal disruption.

Beyond just the set up, Seamless have been integral to proactively maintaining the integrations. When Microsoft updates their system or releases a new feature, it can have knock on effects to how other systems are connected.

“That’s where Seamless is great because something goes down, we can’t contact Microsoft but Chris [Duncan, Seamless] will answer his phone and he’ll fix it,” says Bianchi.

These updates could happen anywhere from once a week, to monthly, and fixing the integrations is critical because staff might not be able to fill in timesheets or they might not get paid.

“Once they fix it, they figure out a way to make it more robust so that the next time it might not break,” adds Bianchi. 

Seamless timesheeting and billing processes

Integrating data from Field Services, emails, timesheets and stock inventory are all essential for Nelmac Kūmānu to accurately bill clients and pay their team. The finance system was a big change from “a pretty outdated system” that they had been using, and connecting all these parts was a challenge.

What was once manual and time-consuming for the contract support team, has now become an automated process between systems. An API pulls live data from the Councils directly into the Business Central finance system. The result is a smoother process for managing how jobs are assigned, completed, and invoiced end-to-end.

Around 20 people use Business Central daily, and they rely on these integrations. “But it does impact everyone,” says Bianchi. 

“Because when a job comes in from the Council, it automatically goes into our finance and timesheet systems, with the correct open and close dates — which means everyone in the organisation can put in their timesheets properly, and they can be paid.” 

Elimination of manual, paper-based processes

The integrations have also eliminated a paper-based process between Nelmac Kūmānu and their suppliers. Previously, suppliers filled in a form and emailed it to the finance team, who would manually load data into the finance system.

Now, an integration between Solar and Business Central means supplier information forms can be filled in electronically on Solar, and pushed to the finance system.

“The time saved is substantial, and it’s also the fact that we don’t have to duplicate everything. It all talks to each other and all our systems have the same information all at once,” says Bianchi.

“It is hard to quantify the improvement, but we actually couldn’t exist without the integrations now. They’re very integral to how we do our business,” she adds.

Faster data sharing with partner organisations

When local government clients previously raised work orders (for issues like water leaks) on their system, one of Nelmac Kūmānu’s contract support staff would have to manually enter this information into vWork. They would also then have to manually update the job status back in the Council’s system upon completion.

“Councils use completely different asset management systems, so the data has to be securely and accurately transformed to the right format,” Nic Stuart explains. “Before, it would have required a lot of manual handling on their end, but Seamless has created a process that pulls the information out and transforms it into something usable to go straight into their system.”

“All of this is time-saving, but now our team can also focus on customer focused, value-add work rather than menial monotonous tasks,” says Stuart.

Improved efficiency and accuracy of reporting

Local Council clients also need water quality data for their reporting and previously, this data would have been provided manually. 

Now, Nelmac Kūmānu has an integration for Water Outlook, a reporting body for water quality, so Nelson City Council gets live data from Nelmac Kūmānu’s vWork system via an API, saving time and reducing errors from manual input. 

“It makes reporting easier for them, as well as saving time,” says Stuart. 

Process

Seamless had operated in a ‘technical consultant’ capacity on Nelmac Kūmānu’s behalf for years, and had previously worked on GIS solutions and a health and safety integration for the organisation.

At the beginning of the process to replace their finance system, Nelmac Kūmānu sent through their requirements and Seamless responded with a proposal. “That’s where they’re really helpful — they can see what we want to do but can also think about implications and other things we haven’t thought of,” says Bianchi.

“We have a really good working relationship with them, they really understand our business requirements,” Bianchi adds.

It’s often the case that Nelmac Kūmānu might have two software providers connecting to support their business operations. As a result, Seamless has also developed a good working relationship with the developers at Solar, improving the level of support they jointly provide.

All of this is powered by the FME integration platform. Seamless hosts and administers FME as-a-Service and brings their ready-to-deploy system connectors and automations to optimise workflows across Nelmac Kūmānu’s systems.

What’s next for the team at Nelmac Kūmānu?

Looking ahead, Nelmac Kūmānu will be able to respond to evolving regulatory needs, as well as implementing new service features for Councils.

A new asset management software rollout for water assets will require Nelmac Kūmānu and Seamless to implement new integrations. Future maintenance projects will also have the added benefit of integration.

“One thing we’ll be doing is the painting and testing of fire hydrants or water hydrants around the city,” Stuart says. 

The solution will include a GIS platform with the locations of all the hydrants, with a workflow for the field team to be assigned and tracked against the work done. This will feed into a reporting dashboard for the Council so they can track Nelmac Kūmānu’s progress.

About Nelmac Kūmānu 

Nelmac Kūmānu has a team of about 280, spread across the top of the South Island of New Zealand. They provide environmental asset management services in the core areas of greenspaces, conservation, commercial projects and three waters, along with Landscape Architecture and Planning services.

Established in 1995 as a Council Trading Organisation, they now work with a range of trusts, community organisations, local and national government authorities, commercial companies, organisations and individuals.