Citisoft, the specialist investment management consultancy, has helped Schroder Investment Management improve its fee billing and revenue administration systems.
Citisoft says Schroders wanted to restructure billing administration to increase process efficiency and coherence. A centralised team was set up to co-ordinate invoicing and revenue calculation for Schroders’s four London-based institutional business units (representing portfolios domiciled in UK, Europe, and North America, along with Fixed Income mandates).
Schroders selected Advantage Fee System from Interactive Technologies in August 2002, and Citisoft has project managed the implementation. Advantage will calculate fees for 100 per cent of Schroders’s portfolios in London and New York and will fully automate the calculation of monthly accruals. The elimination of manual inputting will significantly reduce the risk of human error.
Advantage will interface with the Eagle PACE investment database and portfolio management system for the delivery of valuations data and reporting of management fees.
“We engaged Citisoft as we had been pleased with their work on previous implementations,” says Marc Nield, Executive Director, Institutional IT at Schroders. “The project has gone very much to plan, with no show-stopping problems. Interactive Technologies responded quickly to fixing bugs and the system has gone live in this quarter as intended. The project has given Schroders the opportunity to rationalise our fee production and accrual process. We have standardised the format of invoices and greatly increased the level of detail on fee calculation – improving transparency for the client. Advantage is also giving us much more accurate and effective management information on Schroders’ revenue streams. We are now looking very closely at the possibility of using Advantage Fee System in all of Schroders’ overseas offices.”
Julian Manfredi, Project Manager at Citisoft, adds: “The changes to fee billing were well received throughout the business. During the course of the project, we were able to extend the scope to include the New York operation. The implementation of Advantage was very much a team effort with first-class resources provided by both Schroders and Interactive Technologies, and we delivered on time and to budget.”
James Emson, Managing Director, Interactive Technologies commented: “By using Advantage Fee System, Schroders will receive the information that enables management to make business decisions. The new system will give transparency on where revenues are coming from and how they are broken down by business unit. Schroders’ clients will receive clear and customised invoices, whilst Schroders will be able to invoice all portfolios in a matter of hours. The increased speed of invoicing will have a major cash flow benefit for the company.”
Founded in 1993, Interactive Technologies is a provider of billing systems to the financial industry, with offices in the US, UK and Canada. The company specializes in billing and revenue management software, and the Advantage Fee System is the company’s only product. Applicable to both investment management and banking, it is applied to all types of custody and trust, cash management, employee benefits, and similar tasks. The system is used by a wide range of investment managers, large and small, and a majority of the ten largest US banks. Ancillary modules include Accruals, an STP Scheduler, Management Information packages, a Commissions Sub-system, and an Internet Invoice Viewer.