Spending too much time manipulating spreadsheets?
When doing a system review for a client, it was mentioned that they spent a few days every month just manipulating price list spreadsheets that came in from suppliers.
Columns had to be adjusted and re-sequenced and then margins and/or discounts applied before they were able to be imported into the business system.
Each of these documents were in different formats and the whole process was time consuming and fraught with the possibility of manual error.
We suggested that these processes could be automated and after discussions got the go-ahead to develop a solution.
The new software enables the user to enter and store the formats for all the different price lists, including the detail of what each of the columns contains.
He can then add lookups and mathematical operations to any column and design the output format for the data.
As new spreadsheets are received, they are passed into the application and are now processed automatically. The data is validated and providing it is formatted correctly, the output is then sent directly into the business system.
The application saves a senior person many hours of time and provides a more robust and error free method of processing in comparison with the previous manual methods.