Medical Imaging Systems: Helping a company increase its profits while sales remain flat
"Our sales have been flat for several years, but our profits have gotten bigger, and I attribute that to the fact that WennSoft enables us to better track our costs and become more efficient."
Jeff Burse
Comptroller for Medical Imaging Systems
About Medical Imaging Systems
Medical Imaging Systems (MIS) has been providing imaging excellence to the medical community since 1956. The concept of giving customers the choice of better equipmentservice at more competitive prices was manifested in a partnership between William Schaefer and Stanley Pope and was incorporated as P&S X-ray Company. A lot has changed over the five decades since this partnership was created to provide an alternative to OEM service. The company grew to not only provide equipment service, but also state-of-the-art imaging equipment. In 2000 the company was renamed Medical Imaging Systems to express the expanded services and products that they provide.
Today MIS is the largest independent equipment service provider in Alabama. Their customers span throughout Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee. They have more than 20 employees at work across the southeast United States to fulfill their promise of providing greater value to their customer’s radiology departments.
The Challenge
MIS was having difficulty managing its operations and financials. The problem stemmed from doing everything manually with paper and spreadsheets.
On the sales side, it was difficult to oversee the numerous details and costs associated with selling a major piece of equipment. In addition to delivering the equipment, MIS is responsible for assembling and demonstrating the equipment. These transactions become very complex; taking many months or even a year before they are complete. In addition to numerous project details, the sales process results in a variety of costs, including shipping, outside contractor’s fees, travel expenses and commissions.
On the service side, they had a slew of problems preventing them from maximizing their operations. They were unable to monitor the performance of their management contracts or determine profitability on contacts. It was difficult to track service calls and determine when they needed to pursue a customer to get the contract renewed.
The Solution
To aid them on the sales side, MIS began using WennSoft Job Cost, a complete project management software solution with the superior financial management capabilities of Microsoft Dynamics® GP financials. Job Cost gave MIS the ability to utilize job data and proactively manage labor, materials, equipment, subcontractors and other user-defined cost categories.
They were able to enter all their costs into Job Cost, which is integrated into the company’s accounting system. It increased their ability to access information quickly, allowing them to look at a variety of metrics, including how much has been billed and how much the customer has paid.
“We didn’t have this ability before, which has helped us tremendously,” said Jeff Burse, Comptroller for Medical Imaging Systems. “Job Cost has made a huge difference in the profitability of the equipment we sell.”
Improved Accuracy
When MIS used spreadsheets, they had problems with potential for errors, since there was no integration with the company’s accounting system. For example, someone might generate a PO for materials or services, but forget to add it to the customer’s spreadsheet. When it came time to send the bill to the customer, it was more than likely that the costs associated with that particular PO would never get billed to a customer.
WennSoft decreased this margin of error. When MIS generates a PO in Job Cost, the PO is automatically linked to a specific job. In addition to improving accuracy, it enables the project manager to see all the incurred costs throughout the span of the project.
“With WennSoft, we’re less likely to make mistakes that could result in lost revenue, and we’ve got a lot more checks and balances,” said Burse.
Better Service Management
Service Maintenance Contracts are the lifeblood of Medical Imaging Systems, accounting for approximately 60% of their revenue. They have many repetitive billings done monthly or quarterly, and one person is responsible for generating all of the contract invoices and renewing contracts.
Prior to using WennSoft, they were using paper spreadsheets to handle their maintenance contracts, which was labor intensive, ineffective and prone to error. By managing their maintenance contracts manually, they were more likely to let a contract expire without anyone pursuing its renewal.
“It was a very haphazard and disorganized method for handling such a large part of our business,” said Burse. To improve their service business, MIS added WennSoft Service Management Series, a software solution designed to meet the diverse needs of asset-based service organizations.
Service Management Series provided MIS with a variety of robust functionality. It enabled them to determine the profitability of various contracts, identify which accounts have bigger margins and determine the costs associated with each contract. It also helped them ensure the equipment they were responsible for was being managed properly. “Service Management Series provides us with essential details that we’ve never been able to consistently keep track of, which makes us more competitive and enables us to continue to offer the best possible customer service,” said Burse.
The Benefits of High-Level, Integrated Software
MIS has seen a definite transition in their business efficiencies from the days when they did everything manually with spreadsheets and paper. Since they have many jobs going on concurrently, it is easy to misplace or forget about costs or billings. It also requires much more staff attention.
“Someone has to constantly manage the details to determine what things have been ordered or shipped, said Burse. “In addition to being difficult to oversee, it is susceptible to error.”
MIS believes in the benefits of technology for making their business more competitive and has made significant investments into their software solution. Burse said it takes ongoing investment to stay on the cutting edge.
He appreciates the continuing upgrades offered by WennSoft and Great Plains, because it makes them that much better and more profitable. WennSoft has helped give MIS better tools and provided checks and balances.
“A lot of people are worried about the economy, but our business is doing great. We’re having record profits this year because WennSoft has helped us manage our costs and made us more efficient,” said Burse.