Leading further education college replaces spreadsheets with asset management software from RAM

Lakes College has selected Real Asset Management’s Series4000 to manage its extensive and varied fixed assets

Lakes College, one of Cumbria’s top Further Education Colleges, has installed comprehensive, integrated asset management software from Real Asset Management (RAM). The new system will manage the fixed assets of separate departments over the entire campus centrally, helping control financial, legal, accounting and compliance requirements as it replaces the outdated and inadequate spreadsheet system previously in place.

Neil Hamblin is Computer Services and Systems Manager at Lakes College and played a central role in selecting RAM’s software, in an order valued in the region of £10,000.  He comments, “For about five years, we’ve managed all of the college’s fixed assets via infrequently updated spreadsheets. These all stood alone and were held in separate departments. No data they contained was held centrally or tied into any inventories, and during one internal audit we realised we needed a better way of managing our assets.”

Hamblin and his team chose to replace their spreadsheets with RAM’s Series4000. Already used by over 3,000 clients in more than 70 countries, Series4000 is a sophisticated integrated system. It incorporates every aspect of fixed asset accounting, capital project control, lessee asset accounting, asset budgeting, help desk management, inventory control, asset tracking, maintenance management and capital allowance calculations in one comprehensive solution which can be tailored to perfectly match specific business needs.

For Hamblin, it was this versatility of RAM’s software together with its reporting capabilities that was particularly appealing. Lakes College’s fixed assets range from land and buildings to office furniture and IT to chemistry lab equipment, all of which can be accounted for and tracked easily with Series4000. Hamblin continues, “The new system had to meet lots of criteria. In accountancy terms alone, fixed asset management is very complicated while for inventories, it’s imperative that all assets are tracked accurately. This was where other systems we considered failed to impress. They couldn’t accommodate IT, buildings and machinery all together. Series4000 can cope with every category of fixed asset all over the college campus. It meets all compliance requirements necessary for the Finance Director and I can locate any asset extremely quickly without wading through acres of spreadsheets.”

Hamblin and his team anticipate experiencing the full benefits of their specially tailored system at the tax year end, a notoriously laborious time when the spreadsheet asset management method was in use. Longer term, the centralised management of all fixed assets is just the beginning of Lakes College’s plans for Series4000. Hamblin adds, “Our licence covers us for all the available modules. We want to investigate maintenance and project software too – there are loads of potential benefits for us there.”

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