Customer Success Story

Community Resources for Justice

At a Glance
Company	Community Resources for Justice
Industry	Non-Profit
Headquarters	Boston, MA
Employees	337
Logistics	Serves more that 1,300 clients annually
Business Challenge	Antiquated financials systems lacked flexibility and functionality for expanding organization
Solution	Epicor for Non-Profit
Business Benefits	Time savings through ability to move journal entries and schedules to and from Microsoft Excel Faster compiling of financial statements Highly scalable and flexible architecture makes adapting to growth straightforward Improved efficiency and increased accuracy through automated work flow Streamlined reporting process through drill down capabilities

Community Resources for Justice knows the importance of giving people a second chance and helping them take positive steps to move forward in their lives. A non-profit organization that promotes a safe and just society for all people through direct care programs, education and advocacy, Community Resources for Justice sought to replace its antiquated financials system without straining its strict financial and personnel resources. The organization was growing rapidly and needed a system that could handle higher volume.

When Kathleen Zawasky, CFO at Community Resources for Justice, was looking at several options to replace an old DOS-based system, she turned to Armand Brunelle, president of Emerald Consulting Partners, LLC, for his opinion on Epicor’s products. Brunelle highly recommended the Epicor for Non-Profit system for its ease of use, allocations application, and the relatively straightforward implementation process.

Community Resources for Justice’s previous DOS-based system had limited flexibility in year-end closing, posting, queries, and report writing. One of Epicor’s strongest selling points was the ability to move journal entries and schedules to and from Microsoft Excel thus saving time. Epicor also changed the Community Resources for Justice’s working environment by enabling the entire accounting staff to start the new fiscal year without waiting to close out the previous fiscal year using lengthy and complicated closing procedures. The team at Emerald Consulting, an Epicor exclusive value-added reseller, provided excellent support throughout the implementation process and most importantly, did it under budget.

“After a merger a few years ago, our growth rate has been considerable with a 28 percent increase year over year. When I started at Community Resources for Justice four years ago, our operating budget was $5.5 million in annual revenues; and now, we are at $16.5 million,” said Zawasky. “We added people and programs and just had to have a software solution that could keep up. Fortunately, with the architecture behind Epicor for Non-Profit, we can keep up with our growth.”

Easy, Quick and Powerful — Epicor for Non-Profit
Because Community Resources for Justice has a very complex budget, they needed a system that would integrate with Microsoft Excel and FRx. This, coupled with Epicor’s powerful Advanced Allocations component, were strong selling points for the Epicor system. In addition, Epicor for Non-Profit was easy to learn and the core modules were quickly understood by the accounting staff. Also, Epicor for Non-Profit is great in terms of implementation,” said Zawasky.

Community Resources for Justice’s accounting system must accommodate multiple grants and government contracts serviced from many locations. Expense vouchers, gross wages, and amortized costs need to be re-distributed by several types of percentage bases. The Advanced Allocations module completely automates this process. Epicor’s core financials of General Ledger, Accounts Receivable and Accounts Payable helped the accounting staff immediately by allowing them to export check register data, automatically generate payment batches and import sizable journal entries from Excel. This eliminated redundant data entry.

In addition, learning to build income statements in FRx proved very intuitive. Once Community Resources for Justice went live with Epicor, operating managers were able use clearly readable financial statements to help control costs in their individual programs. The formats provided by FRx helped directors better analyze budget to actual figures. According to Zawasky, “The Epicor solution has proven very successful at my agency. After just a few months, we were able to use the data to create our budget for the next fiscal year. A demonstration with FRx drill downs totally impressed our board of directors.”

Delivering Solid Results
Community Resources for Justice took advantage of the customization capabilities within Epicor for Non-Profit and were happy with their ability to format financial reports in a user-friendly way. This alone has streamlined their reporting process as everything has a consistent look and feel and can be drilled down for additional and more detailed information. Zawasky said, “Epicor for Non-Profit has streamlined our processes immensely. We have formatted the financial reports in a way that is very user friendly to staff and very informative to our board of directors—they like the product they are working with.”

In addition, Epicor for Non-Profit has enhanced elements of the Accounts Payable and Accounts Receivable process, allowing Community Resources for Justice to get their financial statements out much more quickly than they did before. The added integration with FRx and Crystal Reports adds a whole new dimension to what Community Resources for Justice can do with their budgeting reports. “The bottom line is that Epicor for Non-Profit saves us a lot of time,” said Zawasky, who uses it herself to look up vendor disbursements, manage cash flow, and review the trial balance.