“It was just boxes and boxes” – How Minikahda Club beat paperwork with Quadient AP

Monday, Mar 29th 2021
It was just boxes and boxes

Minikahda Club is a golf club and course which is steeped in history and tradition. It hosted the US Open in 1916 and the Walker Club in 1957 and was founded back in 1898.

But the Minnesota club was in desperate need of updating its accounts payable (AP) processes to modern times.

Everything was done manually, requiring hours of data entry – and leading to huge stacks of paperwork and filing cabinets which were hard to keep track of.

Randy Zats“Our attic was just boxes and boxes of paperwork,” said controller, Randy Zats. “It was expensive, unwieldy, inefficient and unproductive – a disaster waiting to happen.”

“We really needed something to get us lighter on our feet.”

Any solution had to be easy to use and compatible with the team’s accounting software – which not every software provider could do.

There were 15 people in the company that were approving invoices every month, but they were getting stuck with a way of working which was paper-heavy, and caused a disconnect between departments.

“Change can be difficult for people who are used to the old ways, but there are so many benefits, and Quadient Accounts Payable Automation by Beanworks is very user-friendly.” – Nyng Yang, AP Specialist, Minikahda Club

“It was very compartmentalized with a lot of silos,” Zats points out. “Invoices were going to the central office, they were going to the managers, they were going to the employees, so it was very hard to control.”

Managers would manually code each invoice in handwriting, then hand them to the AP team to input into Jonas, their main financial system. To be sure they had paid an invoice, a copy of the check would be placed on top of it and then the invoice would be filed away. Little wonder then that their offices were filled with filing cabinets to hold all this paper.

“Minikahda Club was able to spot USD $10,000 in overpayments.” – Randy Zats, AP Controller, Minikahda Club

Taking back control

mc pool

What was critical for Minikahda Club’s AP team was taking back some control over their financial processes, including tackling issues such as duplicate invoices.

They turned to Quadient AP which is a Jonas partner, and the results were impressive.

“It picks up duplicate invoices,” said AP specialist, Nyng Yang. “I don’t have to do all that hard work, checking all the individual numbers.”

Getting an overview of all payments and vendors meant Minikahda was able to spot USD $10,000 in overpayments including credits and duplicate payments.

“Finally, we were able to control the process better,” said Zats.

And there were other advantages as the club moved to working remotely. Instead of having to review physical invoices, managers can approve or disapprove them online.

For example, the club’s general manager can use the Quadient AP mobile app to make those approvals instantly, wherever she is in the club or off-site.

“Quadient AP is a game changer.” – Louisa Bergsma, COO, Minikahda Club

Yang said that the search facility on Quadient AP has made it easier to find items such as invoices.

“Change can be difficult for people who are used to the old ways, but there are so many benefits, and Quadient AP is very user-friendly,” she said.

It has all added up to the team gaining greater visibility over the club’s finances, making month-end and audit much easier.

Zats added: “The key word is control. Once we close, we know that we’ve got everything, there isn’t something hidden in a desk drawer or something that’s going to come back in a week.”

“It has pushed accountability back to the managers because everyone is watching their budgets and their metrics.”

As a result, the team can have more confidence in their financials, and even their audit this year was “a dream.”

Thanks to Quadient AP, Minikahda Club’s AP team can truly say it is now lighter on its feet.

Louisa BergsmaCOO, Louisa Bergsma said: “Quadient AP is a game changer. It has put the accent on service in a service department. It has accelerated the speed in which they can respond to departmental requests for information and reduced stress by making month-end cutoff easier to manage.”

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