With over 1000 employees at sea and more than 40 vessels, ESVAGT is one of the heavyweights in maritime safety and support. Quality, safety and reliability are keywords for the company, which services offshore wind farms, among other things. This also applies to the financial sector, where Curit has set a new course in ESVAGT with IFS Applications.
By Hanne Hyldborg CATO Communication
Based at the Port of Esbjerg, Denmark, ESVAGT operates a significant fleet of vessels for rescue, oil spill response in and around oil and gas fields and servicing offshore wind farms. The multifaceted company has a complex system landscape that includes the payroll system OMEGA, the procurement system Sertica, the travel accounting system AcuBiz and Microsoft CRM.
Finance was also previously managed in Microsoft - in an Axapta solution - but since the end of 2019, IFS Applications has been the financial link between the other systems. Curit has implemented the new finance solution from IFS. Curit won the tender ahead of a number of other suppliers based on its competences, implementation model and the extensibility of the IFS platform. Curit already has customers in the offshore and maritime sectors and, not least, deep experience with the finance module, which is the core of IFS Applications.
Photo: Esvagt
Flexibility is key
“We were about to upgrade MS Axapta and decided to look at other options. That's why we went to the market for a new finance solution. Curit came up with the best overall package and was the best match both in terms of competences and chemistry”, says Marianne Hostrup Poulsen, Head of Finance at ESVAGT.
“We see a lot of opportunities in the IFS platform, which can offer many interesting things in the long run. At the same time, the solution is not too big and fits our needs right now”, she says, explaining that the price/content ratio was crucial in choosing the IFS platform and that the flexibility was an added bonus.
Easy integration, smooth expansion
Founded as a modular platform, IFS Applications is based on open principles and strong integration capabilities. The possibilities for expanding the solution as new business needs arise are therefore great, and it is easy to integrate with other systems.
“It's crucial for us that the finance system can integrate with our other systems, including payroll, procurement, CRM and our travel management system. IFS offers the opportunity to bring everything together on their platform, which is an interesting perspective. Initially, however, we have chosen a pure finance solution, and we have had very good experiences with it. It's an intuitive solution that has changed and optimised the way we work with financial management. We have a better and more accurate financial overview in IFS Applications than we had before.”, says Marianne Hostrup Poulsen and explains that many manual financial processes are now automated.
A true financial picture
ESVAGT has also said goodbye to a lot of Excel administration. For example, the centralised asset register was previously managed in Excel, but is now handled in IFS, which is a great advantage as ESVAGT has many vessels and associated projects.
One of the areas where ESVAGT has noticed a difference is financial provisions. Previously, the creation of purchase orders and financial provisions did not go hand in hand and the purchase amount was only set aside when the invoice was received, which distorts the monthly overview. Today, financial provisions are automatically created for everything from paint purchases to the spare parts and screws needed to maintain the ships. Regardless of whether the purchase orders are made at sea or on land in Sertica, it results in a financial provision in IFS.
“We now have an agile system where newly created customers in the CRM system are automatically transferred to the financial system with the necessary data to create an invoice for the customer, and purchase orders created in Sertica are automatically imported and create a financial provision. It's a great improvement”, says Marianne Hostrup Poulsen.
ESVAGT has benefited greatly from working with Curit during the implementation of IFS Applications. Today, ESVAGT is largely self-sufficient and therefore the contact is no longer so close.
“We still have a good dialogue with Curit, but there is less communication. We are only in contact if our customisations and integrations fail and we can't solve it ourselves”, says Marianne Hostrup Poulsen.