Regardless of their size or location, most financial organizations manually match transactions and submit journals to complete bank reconciliations. Problems with bank reconciliation are not influenced by the size of the organization, yet numerous mid-sized businesses have trouble balancing their books. Reconciliation is challenging for them mostly because of the variety of accounts and institutions they work with, as well as the different payment methods and time zones. The same holds true for the bills. Numerous human errors are caused by the volume of received purchase orders and the number of entries in each order that need to be reconciled.

The Client:- The client is a financial institution based in Dubai, UAE

Challenges Faced

 For our client, the clients and cash flows are complex & tedious as it is from various sources and banks. The staff had to spend longer work hours on the manual reconciliation, which was a tedious, time-consuming, monotonous task. It was also prone to human errors creeping in during the manual entry during the reconciliation process. Errors such as date & time discrepancies, and duplicate entries were also a huge issue, this of course led to delays in work and in one case almost led to a loss of reputation with a client. There were also multiple transactions to handle on a single invoice, which led to further delays.

What We Offered

Finding information about the funds received and spent to balance the final figures is made possible by automating reconciliation. By comparing payment information with bank data, RPA helps to automate this procedure. The accounts are said to be reconciled if the details line up. When there are differences in the data, RPA sends the records back for additional verification.

These are the major features of the project we did for the client:

• Retrieval of Bank statements: Automation to create reports and download bank statements, and to securely log into your online banking platform.
• Transaction reconciliation: The bots sign into your desktop or web-based ERP/POS and compare the information in the bank/credit card statements to the transactions in your ERP/POS.
• Verify transactions: A spreadsheet’s Y/N designation can be used to view the status of reconciliation.
• Share reconciliation report: Email a reconciliation report to your accounting team each day, marking any unreconciled transactions as needing further investigation.

How the Client Benefitted

 Month-end reporting in real time

• The accounting team can promptly present correct financial statements to the firm’s leadership by using automated bank reconciliation rather than the traditional procedure, which can take an average company 12–24 days to complete.

94% less time spent on human work

• Manual bank reconciliation can take up to three hours of an employee’s time per day if it is done every day. The employee will only need to spend ten minutes examining unposted transactions thanks to automation.

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HLB HAMT - Audit, Tax, Accounting and Business Advisory

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Varun R Chandra

07:38 25 Apr 21

HLB Hamt is highly recommended! They have the quality of services that would satisfy your needs. I'm glad I found them.

Giuseppe Assi

06:20 31 Jan 21

I HAD A GOOD EXPERIENCE WITH HLB HAMT DUBAI. THEY HAVE A VERY PROFESSIONAL TEAM, GOOD QUALITY OF SERVICES, GOOD VALUE... FOR PRICE.I RECOMMEND THIS COMPANY.read more

Mohamed Sheriff

16:16 28 Jun 20

Experience with HLB Hamt in audit experience is great pleasure. They deploy well qualified accounts team for audits.... And the amount of checking they perform give the management of the company confidence that internal controls are well in place. We are glad to see they have high standard of audit practices.read more

218141 JOSEPH THOMAS

16:20 23 Jun 20

Professionally managed firm with commitment to the engagements taken. My company and its group are assigning our... requirements for last 12 years to HLB and we don’t have any negative remarks on any assignments.read more

PMI

07:14 23 Jun 20

In my opinion, HLB Hamt is one of the best professional firms in UAE after big4. Excellent client service, professional... and competent staff and timely delivery are their strength. Over the years they have developed the infrastructure and skill set to handle multiple verticals ie, audit, tax services, consulting, IT support etc.Wishing HLB Hamt team all the very best.read more

RAVI CHOKSI

08:28 21 Jun 20

Thank you Team HLB hamt...Your internal auditing team put the good amount of time and inputs in helping the... organisation making considerable improvements throughout the organisational working structure and helps in building the better business.Thanks.read more

Maharajan Subramaniam

18:17 06 Jun 20

High-Performing IT Teams, I'm impressed with the knowledge level of their deputed staff, audit procedures, and... checklist adopted. Mr. Vimal especially understand the requirement and provide solution not only technical feasibility and also considered budgeting. We’re confident in their abilities.read more

Mohammed L

08:07 05 Jun 20

We have been working closely with them on payroll services for quite sometime.They provide very professional... services,experts in domain and excellent support. Would recommend them.Cheers.read more

ROY ROSHAN VIVIAN

06:32 04 Jun 20

Very professional team. Vimal has always given us good solution advice for various Software and IT Infra projects. We... are very Extremely satisfied working with him and his team. Wishing them success.read more

Basil Daniells

05:55 03 Jun 20

I have worked with HLB as a partner of Sage for about 2 years, they were dedicated to the success of the partnership... and kept aligned with the business plan that was agreed between our two companies. They are always ready to go the extra mile for a customer and don’t shy away from challenging circumstances. Keep up the good work and wish you all the success in the future.read more

Amar Kashyap

19:28 02 Jun 20

Team of well qualified and organised professionals. Their reports are not based on numbers first they will understand... their client and their business. They are highly recommended and trust worthy.read more

Radz de Jesus

16:03 02 Jun 20

We're glad to have found HLB Hamt to conduct the IT audit and risk assessment for our organization. We have learned a... lot from their team during that first project. And since then, we've continued to be in touch with them. Mr. Vimal especially is very good at presenting technical concepts in simple yet interesting ways that non-IT and business people alike would easily catch. We are very happy with the professionalism and quality of service they provide. They leave their clients nothing short of satisfied. Highly recommended.read more

Next Reviews

Challenge

• The company ‘s Finance department was unable to meet requirements of user departments, and was perceived to be too slow, despite a team of 50 employees at the HO and about 100 employees in their branches
• The Board felt that this department’s functioning would be a hindrance for the company’s growth plans

Work done and Impact

• Analyzed the department structure, workflows and processes – in line with the set growth objectives
• Recommended realignment of workflows, and decentralization of the Finance department.
• Helped to redefine the Authority Matrix and introduced review systems to ensure that the decentralized structure works effectively.
• Identified and recommended areas of automation which enabled savings in manpower costs yet improved efficiency and controls

Challenge

• Our client was evaluating an attractive business proposition to invest in a specialized product trading and technical services provider in the UAE. The client had industry knowledge and had a favorable view of the target company but wanted to determine the right transaction price for the acquisition.

Work done and Impact

• • Our team of internal auditors and analysts conducted a detailed due diligence of the target company. This include in-depths analysis of their numbers as well as review of internal systems and controls

Action / Impact:

Were able to identify some key issues such as excessive dependencies of some customers and a steady marginal decline in revenue from their more profitable products.

There were also some accounting practices relating to provisions were incorrectly followed, as also some intercompany loans which were irregular.

The report helped our client to assess the projected business better to make a more informed valuation decision. They were also able to address compliance issues by making process changes after they completed the acquisition

Challenge

• The company’s owners were unable to get the desired results from the CEO who was long associated with the company externally but was in the CEO role only for a short period
• There were a few senior employees who were not performing, but the owners could not really determine the causes
• Employees at lower levels were lacking motivation

Work done and Impact

• We conducted detailed meetings with the Management and key employees across different levels to understand their expectations and concerns.
• We analyzed various internal processes and the authority delegation followed, and important business metrics.
• Based on the above, we were able to recommend an effective new structure that eliminated the need for a few employees who were actually a hindrance to the system
• The company obtained savings in costs, the owners found it easier to implement their plans and the employees down the line were more motivated and able to work more productively

Challenge

• No practice of periodic evaluation of suppliers’ performance.

Work done and Impact

• Ensured the implementation of an objective supplier evaluation process

Action / Impact:

Were able to understand that there was a need to replace some suppliers and balance purchases across others; about 6 new suppliers were identified resulting in improved costs, lead times and QC compliance

Challenge

• Poor stock controls and inadequate review of goods on the production floor

Work done and Impact

• In-depth analysis of stock was done across different stages of production – Raw Material  / Work In Progress / Finished Goods

Action / Impact:

Reduction in the value of items in the WIP warehouse by approx. 33% over a 6-month period without loss in production output

Challenge

• Lack of visibility on financials and unexpected drops in results due to old stocks and sticky receivables

Work done and Impact

• Root cause analysis was done. Primary reasons were lack of strong internal reviews and weak provisioning processes followed for stock and receivables. The existing provisioning processes for both debtors and stock were not aligned to reality. The age of the receivable was not adequately scrutinized and provision for stocks were not aligned to realizable discounted prices.

Action / Impact:

More realistic provisioning criteria were applied and a one-time hit in numbers was consciously taken. Related KPIs were also made and integrated with performance reviews. Subsequently, this resulted in greater internal sensitization among operating teams and also lesser surprises.

Challenge

• A company that was into large scale catering was finding it difficult to assess their employee adequacy
• The senior management believed that there was excess manpower – yet, managers and employees on the ground perceived a manpower shortage
• There were also consistently high overtime payouts

Work done and Impact

• Using primary and secondary sources, we obtained relevant industry data on Employee to Customer ratios across similar companies
• We analyzed the overtime costs and staff requests at department level, and found that major issues were in the Kitchen
• Our consultants carried out a Time and Motion study, covering all shifts of the kitchen for a period of 4 days and analyzed areas of high staff requirement
• We found that there were no major instances of slackness among employees
• However, on further analysis, we were able to pin-point certain specific items in the menus offered that were very high on cooking / preparation time
• We checked the criticality of these menu items to customer requirements with the concerned operating teams. With their feedback, we concluded that by changing some specific menu items, we could reduce the cooking time and hence staff workload and overtime significantly

Challenge

A client company who was into project sales across the region had approached us with the following concerns:

• They were unsure if they were overstaffed (i.e., was HR cost as % to sales was too high?)
• They were not clear how to downsize if business drops
• Were they paying the right salaries?

Work done and Impact

• We assessed manpower utilization, and determined optimal manpower based on current projects, planned handovers and the order pipeline
• We advised them to restructure their departments and realigned project cost calculations to get better cost estimates
• We built business case scenarios for different situations to estimate the optimal headcount in each situation, thus enabling the company to take the correctly plan manpower
• We benchmarked salaries across relevant competitors to correctly know in which positions where corrections were needed

Challenge

A manufacturing sector client with whom we were associated was facing regular issues of material non-availability despite the Purchase Head being a seasoned employee who had excellent knowledge of products and suppliers

All departments were clear that it was the Purchase team which was at fault for the issue, but there was no apparent solution

Work done and Impact

• On closer analysis of the internal processes, we found that the root cause was that there were too many tasks that the purchase head was doing by himself due to “confidentiality” issues although these were not of any strategic significance.
• The rest of the team was usually engaged in very trivial tasks of little value addition.
• The consultants proposed a new workflow and delegation of authority structure in the department, with proper controls. This ensured better work flows and accountability at all levels, and improved material availability resulting in greater order fulfillment rate, reduced emergency purchases etc.
• The company’s dependence on the Purchase Head was also reduced, thus benefiting business continuity

Challenge

• A locally owned family enterprise that was successfully running for over 30 years in the UAE had appointed a new CEO
• The company’s owners were unable to get the desired results from the CEO despite his excellent past track record and old acquaintance with the owners
• There were a few senior employees who were not performing, but the owners could not really determine the causes
• Employees at lower levels were lacking motivation

Work done and Impact

• We conducted detailed meetings with the Management and key employees across different levels to understand their expectations and concerns.
• We analyzed various internal processes and the authority delegation followed, and important business metrics.
• Based on the above, we were able to recommend an effective new structure that eliminated the need for a few employees who were actually a hindrance to the system
• The company obtained savings in costs, the owners found it easier to implement their plans and the employees down the line were more motivated and able to work more productively