Case Study – Yorkshire Building Society

Yorkshire Building Society Uses Mokum’s Expertise to Streamline Procurement

Customer challenge

• To introduce purchasing controls
• To improve commodity information and expenditure reporting
• To realise savings through informed negotiation with suppliers

Solution

• A re-configuration of Oracle Purchasing in partnership with Mokum

Mokum’s Role

• Project Management
• Subject Matter Expertise – Oracle Purchasing
• Knowledge Transfer to Yorkshire Building Society Finance Systems Team

Key Benefits

• Standardised procurement process across the Society
• Improved management information and control

Yorkshire Building Society is one of the largest building societies in the UK. With 2 million members, assets of £23 billion and a nationwide network of 143 branches, the Yorkshire remains one of the most cost-effective building societies in the industry.

The Society implemented Oracle General Ledger (GL) & Accounts Payable (AP) in 1995. Human Resources & Payroll (HRMS) followed in 1997. The Yorkshire’s Finance Systems team have since implemented a number of additional Oracle E-Business Suite modules including Accounts Receivable (AR) & Fixed Assets (FA).

Existing Configuration

The Oracle Purchasing (PO) module had been implemented at Yorkshire Building Society and was being used daily by one department. However, the existing solution was not scalable to support the purchasing activities of additional departments and would not enforce the required purchasing and financial control or provide adequate management information.

Therefore, the key business objective for the reconfiguration of the Purchasing module was the delivery of:

• a common Purchasing Process for the Society
• financial and purchasing control
• commodity information and expenditure reporting
• improved supplier management information
• detailed accruals & commitments for Management Accounting

It was also imperative that Purchasing be configured to support the potential implementation of Oracle iProcurement.

Collaborative Approach

Mokum’s approach is always to define the work in terms of collaboration between consultants and clients. Having determined the task to be undertaken, deliverables are agreed and resources are assigned, so that all involved know what is expected of them and when. Each phase of the project gives rise to a deliverable which is reviewed and accepted by the client as the cue for starting the next phase. This approach reduces the risk of unexpected issues and ensures that the team’s efforts are always focussed on delivering benefit to the business.

In the post-project review, Yorkshire Building Society expressed its approval of the Mokum collaborative approach and confirmed it would like to adopt it for internal projects in future.

Go Live

A fully-documented reconfiguration of Oracle Purchasing was delivered on time and within budget. All the necessary knowledge was transferred to the internal Finance Systems team to enable roll-out of the scalable solution across the organisation.

“Mokum’s philosophy has always been that business benefit is the driver of any change – to systems, to process or to organisation structure. Yorkshire Building Society wanted that focus to underpin its procurement project – and that was a major contribution to its ultimate success.” 

Mark Bastable, Mokum Director