CR Longley & Co

“When we first introduced the system, turnover was £2million a year and there were three full-time staff in accounts generating reams of paperwork. Today, turnover is £10m yet we only have two people in accounts.”

Company Profile

Charles Longley set up his own business nearly sixty years ago as a local producer of building materials. Since then, the Longley Group of companies has developed into one of the leading suppliers of pre-cast concrete and flooring in the UK, and employs over 70 people from its West Yorkshire base.

Challenge

When John Longley took over the accountancy function of the business in 1995, he inherited a completely paper-based financial accounting system. Everything, from the company ledgers to customer invoicing, was done manually and, in an increasingly computerised age, this way of working was preventing the company from reaching its full potential.  “We needed to introduce an IT system that could take care of all facets of the company’s financial business”, said John, now financial director of CR Longley & Co.

Solution

When TSG, one of Pegasus’s Strategic Partners, started working with Longley’s, it advised on the installation of a Pegasus software system. The company’s external accountants were also using Pegasus so there seemed to be a natural synergy in adopting the same software solution.
The first modules to be introduced were the sales and purchase ledger, which started the replacement of the old paper based system

The introduction of sales and purchase ledger cut out much of the duplication within the system.  However, John considers that the real time savers were the subsequent introductions of the nominal ledger and sales order processing modules.  With sales order processing many laborious hours of data inputting were saved as John explains: “The company typically sends out about 200 invoices per month and prior to the new system we used to have to type out the order, a delivery note, an invoice and then payment details.  Now, these can be produced automatically from the initial input of data, thereby cutting four functions down to one.”

Having recently migrated to Pegasus’ latest solution, Opera II, many more benefits have been brought to Longley.  For instance, documents can be e-mailed and transported to other applications, allowing for a much more efficient use of data.

Results

According to John, the benefits to the company of installing Opera II have been enormous. “Nowadays, you would expect to find many of these functions in a modern office environment but the fact is we had nothing and needed to start somewhere. We now have a computerised system that saves us both time and money, and also befits a company of our size and capability. When we first introduced the system, turnover was £2million a year and there were three full-time staff in accounts generating reams of paperwork. Today, turnover is £10m yet we only have two people in accounts.” 

The Partner Connection

Pegasus delivers Opera II through a network of Partners. Longley & Co chose TSG, a Strategic Partner with offices in several locations throughout the UK– Midlands, North, North East, North West, Scotland and Southampton..

John recalls that TSG put a lot of hard work into getting the initial installation just right and making sure that the users were confident in operating the new software. “An advisor spent a good two days in the office, setting up each PC and demonstrating the different modules.  Their help at this stage was invaluable and at all times they were highly professional,” he said.

Modules:  System Manager, Sales Ledger, Purchase Ledger, Nominal Ledger, Invoicing, SOP, Stock Control, Toolkit, Reporter, Bill of Materials, XRL

Number of Users: 5