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Certinia PS Cloud

Certinia PS Cloud
Formerly FinancialForce PS Cloud

Overview

What is Certinia PS Cloud?

Certinia PS Cloud software is a cloud-based services solution that is built on the Force.com platform. It allows companies to manage professional resources, customers, projects and financials in one integrated services management application. Because the solution works natively with Force.com,…

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Recent Reviews

TrustRadius Insights

Certinia PS Cloud has proven to be a valuable tool for users looking to simplify and streamline their quote-to-cash process. By seamlessly …
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PSA all the way!

9 out of 10
February 20, 2017
Incentivized
The professional services team uses FinancialForce PSA to track time, forecast time, manage projects, escalations, and maximize …
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Awards

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Pricing

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What is Certinia PS Cloud?

Certinia PS Cloud software is a cloud-based services solution that is built on the Force.com platform. It allows companies to manage professional resources, customers, projects and financials in one integrated services management application. Because the solution works natively with Force.com, it…

Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services

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Product Details

What is Certinia PS Cloud?

Certinia PS Cloud (formerly FinancialForce PS Cloud) software is a cloud-based services solution that is built on the Force.com platform. It allows companies to manage professional resources, customers, projects and financials in one integrated services management application. Because the solution works natively with Force.com, it utilizes the same data for sales, services and finance on one system.

Certinia PS Cloud Competitors

Certinia PS Cloud Technical Details

Operating SystemsUnspecified
Mobile ApplicationNo
Security

Frequently Asked Questions

Certinia PS Cloud software is a cloud-based services solution that is built on the Force.com platform. It allows companies to manage professional resources, customers, projects and financials in one integrated services management application. Because the solution works natively with Force.com, it utilizes the same data for sales, services and finance on one system.

OpenAir PSA, Projector PSA, and Kantata PS Cloud are common alternatives for Certinia PS Cloud.

Reviewers rate Support Rating highest, with a score of 9.

The most common users of Certinia PS Cloud are from Mid-sized Companies (51-1,000 employees).
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(27)

Community Insights

TrustRadius Insights are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, 3rd-party data sources. Have feedback on this content? Let us know!

Certinia PS Cloud has proven to be a valuable tool for users looking to simplify and streamline their quote-to-cash process. By seamlessly integrating with Salesforce, users have quick access to tailored reporting and list views based on their role, allowing for efficient management of projects. Automation features within Certinia PS Cloud have been praised for their reliability in project documentation, leading to cost savings and effective resource planning. The software's user-friendly interface and responsive system, equipped with active tracking features and easy-to-use tools, have made it an excellent choice for contact list management functions and simple task management. Additionally, Certinia PS Cloud is utilized by professional service teams to manage all aspects of project scheduling, service delivery, and resource assignment. It also offers robust reporting capabilities for executive teams, assisting in milestone billing, time and expense tracking, and project performance evaluation against planned revenue. Overall, Certinia PS Cloud has become a go-to solution for professional service and project management groups when it comes to managing projects, billing clients, and accurately tracking time and expenses.

Customizable and Flexible: Users have found FinancialForce PSA to be easily customizable to their business needs, as it is built upon the force.com platform. Some reviewers appreciated the ability to tailor the software according to their specific requirements.

Efficient Project Management: Many users praised the ease of creating projects, milestones, and assignments within FinancialForce PSA, which allows for efficient project management. The intuitive interface enables users to quickly set up and track project progress.

Comprehensive Reporting and Data Analysis: Reviewers highlighted the reporting capabilities of FinancialForce PSA as a valuable feature. The strong reporting function allows users to create custom reports and dashboards for tracking performance and conducting comprehensive data analysis. Several customers appreciated how this feature provided them with actionable insights into their business operations.

Resource Planner: Difficult to Assign Resources to Multiple Projects Some users have found the resource planner in Certinia PS Cloud to be convoluted and challenging, particularly when it comes to assigning resources to multiple projects.

Limited Import Tool from MS Project Several project managers have expressed frustration with the one-way import tool from MS Project to Certinia PS Cloud. This limitation requires them to update project details in both systems, adding unnecessary duplication of effort.

Project Planner: Lack of Milestones Visibility The Project Planner tool in Certinia PS Cloud does not display milestones, making it difficult for users to track the completeness of their projects. This lack of visibility can hinder effective project management and progress monitoring.

Users commonly recommend the following:

  1. Clearly define the business case and expected outcomes upfront, working with experienced consultants to build out requirements and business processes. Consider the full tech stack and potential integrations with other cloud platforms. Utilize all available resources and experts to best utilize the tool.

  2. Start small and expand gradually. Emphasize the importance of internal Salesforce experts to support the implementation. Challenge existing operating processes and invest in the capabilities of FinancialForce PSA. Thoroughly test and encourage early user adoption for successful implementation.

  3. Research the product and choose functionality wisely. Engage an experienced implementation consultant and provide critical training for end users. Be willing to adapt internal processes to align with user stories in PSA. Ensure clear system setup options, review Salesforce Refresh, and installation details before implementing FinancialForce.

These recommendations reflect the need for careful planning, expertise, and leveraging available resources to successfully implement and maximize the benefits of FinancialForce PSA.

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(1-3 of 3)
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Machell Enke | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use FF PSA to Manage our Professional Services projects, track time and create billing events for our invoicing. We have PSA seamlessly integrated with our Salesforce solution to ensure our quote to cash process is simple and efficient. PSA is native to the SF platform which allows us to utilize the reporting and list functionality to ensure each end user has quick access to reporting and list views that relate to their roles.
  • 360 view of project management
  • Resource Management and Utilization
  • Managing Budgets vs Actuals
  • Easy time entry and tracking
  • Ability to add multiple project templates in one step
  • More "help" descriptions on fields
FF PSA can be purchased as a "stand alone" force.com application or to be utilized with Salesforce (the platform). This gives companies the full quote to cash with project management life cycle. The application is extremely robust and this gives companies room to grow as they scale their business. PSA is perfect for companies who want to budget and forecast project and manage resources.
  • We are a boutique consulting company and having FF PSA has allowed us to concentrate on the pre-sales side of business instead of being mired in the admin of projects and people.
  • There is some redundancy for our consultants in managing Project Tasks and timecards, however, this is more based on our business process than the product.
  • As a Managing Partner I love the 360 view of our business we get with SF and FF PSA.
FF PSA is a robust Project Management solution that can be configured to fits any size business. We have tried several other applications and PSA so far has met and exceeded our needs. We run our day to day operations on Salesforce so having a solution that is native was a must have. PSA met that requirement and much more.
6
Project Managers, Consultants, Business Development and Managing Partners
4
We currently have 4 Salesforce Sales Cloud Cert Admins who support our PSA solution. This is primarily due to the fact we are a Salesforce and FinancialForce Consulting partner so we have these folks on staff. A resource who is a super user of Salesforce would have the knowledge base to admin PSA.
  • Project Management
  • Timecard Entry
  • Billing Events
  • Auto creation of Projects from Opportunities
  • Change management for our implementation projects
  • Integration with our accounting application to complete and automate quote to cash process
Currently FF PSA is the only offering in the marketplace that meets or exceeds our Project and Resource Management needs and the pricing is within our budget requirements.
No
While having support respond to cases within 2 hours is awesome we have found that FF's Community and Xtra site provide most of the answers we need. We rely on support for issues that are application related or that require escalation due to project bugs.
FF Support for PSA is great. The team is knowledgeable and responsive.
Yes
We have reported several bugs and for each one a workaround was provided until the product development team resolved the issue. We were also updated on the progress of the fix and provided links for release updates to eventually fix the issue.
The PSA Support team members are always knowledgeable and go the extra mile to assist with issues. This is true whether you have purchased premier support or utilize standard support. On more than one occasion support has scheduled GTM's on short notice to quickly resolve an issue that has caused disruption to the work day.
Luke Fitzwater | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
  • The biggest strength of FinancialForce PSA is that it's built upon the force.com platform, which means it is very easily customizable to our business needs.
  • Projects are easily created, as well as milestones and assignments.
  • "Actuals" (dollars and hours) are calculated automatically, and are easily reported on.
  • Resources are easily managed by using the Resource Planner
  • FinancialForce PSA support is outstanding!
  • Scheduling can be tricky. Assigning a resource to the Project is easy, but when viewing the Resource Planner, the resource shows as being scheduled from the Start to End of the Project. If a resource is working on many projects, then the resource planner becomes convoluted.
  • Our Project Managers (PMs) use MS Project to maintain the Project Timelines. There is an import tool w/in PSA, but it is not a two-way feed. PSA only imports the project plan from MS Project. It does not update the Project Plan in MS Project, nor is the Project Plan exportable in PSA, once it has been imported. This causes our PMs to update the Project details and timeline in two systems.
  • The Project Planner tool only shows Project Tasks, it does not show Milestones (which are what we use to track project completeness). We do not use Project Tasks because you cannot assign resources to the Tasks.
  • There are some limitations to Reporting from FinancialForce PSA
It would seem to be well suited for an organization that has standard products/customer requirements. Our organization, however, creates customized solutions for our clients, which can be difficult to track using FinancialForce PSA. We have had to perform many customizations to FinancialForce PSA in order to be able to capture the correct data and report on that data.
  • "Out of the box", FinancialForce PSA was an improvement over our previous project management system (Projector) due to it being cloud based. Our users could access it from anywhere with an internet connection. Our previous software required a LAN or a VPN connection to access.
  • With much customization, system improvements, and training, we have seen a steady increase in user adoption and efficiency
  • FinancialForce PSA is no long just a day to day system. It is now being included in our Strategic Planning
There is another PSA software program that we have been looking into (DreamFactory) that could potentially replace FinancialForce PSA in our organization. Like FinancialForce PSA, it is cloud based on the force.com platform. Licensing is slightly less than FinancialForce PSA, and the Resource Management tool is far superior to FinancialForce PSA. With that said, our renewal falls in Q4 2014 and I don't foresee us implementing a new system this fiscal year.
220
All of the employees in our organization use FinancialForce PSA. Usage ranges from basic Time & Expense Entry, to Resource Management, Project Management, and Project Accounting. We have multiple employees in each of these functions, with the majority of our employees only using the basic time and expense entry functionality.
3
At a minimum, you should have someone on your staff who has Salesforce.com experience. Salesforce.com experience is a necessity for navigating around FinancialForce PSA successfully. Being knowledgeable of the force.com platform will give your admin a huge head start over other IT application support people. Application support experience and limited database experience are also good skills to have to support FinancialForce PSA.
  • After an Opportunity is Closed-Won, we create a new FinancialForce PSA Project.
  • The Resource Manager will staff the Project with resources, initially, as well as add resources as needed after the Project is established.
  • Our Project Accountants will generate billing events based on Milestone completion, which will create invoices to be sent to the Client.
  • Using FinancialForce PSA, many customizations within FinancialForce PSA, and a third party reporting tool, we have created a Project Health Report which captures our top-10 key Project Metrics, and displays them graphically.
  • We're currently working on new (customized) functionality to help us with capacity planning.
  • We are constantly looking at new ways to help us better manage our resources.
Every time I submit a new help request, whether it's an actual help request or just a question about FinancialForce PSA, I always feel that I'm receiving world class support. The support we receive from FinancialForce PSA is always very detailed and professional. There are some requests that take longer than other for the initial response, which is why I did not give a full 10.
Yes
We have reported a couple bugs in the past year. Luckily for us, the bugs were set to be fixed with the next FinancialForce PSA release. In one situation, the time between reporting the bug to it actually being resolved was rather lengthy. We needed to create a work-around while the bug was being fixed.
We had a situation where we were trying to mass assign resources to a Project Milestone, but the Milestone selection wasn't showing on the Mass Assignment page. I contacted FinancialForce PSA support and their representative walked me through turning this feature on. Turning the functionality on took about 2 minutes and was exactly what we needed.
  • Creating New Projects
  • Setting up Milestones on Projects
  • Expense Reporting
  • Time Reporting, especially if a resource is assigned to many projects or milestones on many projects.
  • Resource Management
  • Working with "managed" code or objects as an administrator can be difficult and frustrating, many times, leading to customizations.
Yes
FinancialForce PSA has two mobile apps. One for Time entry, and one for Expense Entry. I am not a fan of the Expense app because you cannot create expense reports using the app, but rather the expense report must already exist and you simply add expense lines to it. When you attach receipts via the mobile interface, they attach to each individual expense line instead of the Expense Report. The time entry app is functionally sound and works appropriately, with the exception of the situation where you have many similarly named assignments. It can be impossible to select the correct assignment from the list if you have many assignments with similar names because after so many characters, the results are truncated.
From my standpoint, FinancialForce PSA is relatively easy to use. As a System Administrator, I am able to maneuver around the software with ease. As a user of FinancialForce PSA, I am able to input my timecards and expense reports without any issues. I have received very positive and very negative feedback about using FinancialForce PSA, however, from users in other functional roles in my organization.
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
  • It integrates really well with Salesforce.com for front-end opportunity management. The transition from a booked deal to a project is a very smooth process
  • The resource management function is visual and pretty efficient, better than other tools reviewed.
  • Time tracking can be done on a smart phone which provides more options to enter time
  • The product is still maturing as a full featured PSA tool. The feature roadmap is compelling but is still being built out.
  • Tool is ideal for managing a services business. It is not yet a project manager tool.
  • Limited reporting
  • Maturing change order process
  • Limited integration to back-end financial systems beyond Financial Force Financials. We use Netsuite.
  • The underlying SalesForce UI is constrained and can be keystroke intensive at times
  • Limited archiving of historical data
  • We used to do our resource management on a white board. This is far more efficient. We are leaps and bounds ahead of where we were operationally in running the business.
  • The credibility of accounting data is far higher than in Open Air. Not all due to the product. When we implemented Financial Force, we used the transition to put in place change controls – much more rigor to support our public company reporting.
We would renew but have been acquired and our parent company will drive the decisions around PSA systems.
Prioritize your integration points as different vendors are going to offer stronger integrations in certain areas (Financials vs. CRM) The software is robust and flexible and supports multiple ways to get things done. Standardize on best practices for common processes, i.e., resource management. Pick your user champions to help guide the process and drive adoption
110
Professional services; business leaders, program/project managers. consultants
5
• 3 services ops people – in the system half time, but using as well as administering • Business analyst – minimal time • Programmer - 20% of time.
  • Project management
  • Change management – change order processing around products
  • Project status/ reporting
  • Resource management
  • Time management – time tracking and making sure time is allocated to right project/ charge number
  • Project accounting
OpenAir from NetSuite
We did look at other SaaS based systems but Salesforce integration was very important in our selection criteria.
  • Vendor implemented
  • Professional services company
Appirio (a professional services firm that developed the product before selling it to FinancialForce) did the implementation and did a good job.
Appirio did a good job, however, the user team didn’t know enough to make all the right configuration/customization choices. The team focused too much on replicating existing processes vs. reengineering them. In hindsight we should have had deep dive reviews at key milestones and enforced more focus on how the software would operate. We didn’t have access to true best practices expertise. In hindsight, a consultant from the outside would have been helpful to drive this.
  • In-person training
It was fine.
work process or feature gaps
No
Has not been needed
Pure customer support is fine and we have not needed much of it that I am aware of.
It is maturing and does what it does well although it is not fully complete. Integration to SF is great. Gives great visibility to incoming services projects and allows the staffing process to start on pipeline deals. There are certain processes that take more click-throughs then needed so there are refinement opportunities around the UI. The resource management screen and project status views have really matured since our original purchase, and while not perfect, allow business leaders to do their jobs. Configurations vs. customizations. We seem to have to bring in an Apex developer to do a customization for changes I would think could be configuration settings.
We have maybe had 1-2 outages over 3 years.
Most of the time it is fine. There are peak periods of usage where performance noticably slows down (i.e., Monday mornings when time is due and many reports are being run).
It's native.
  • Non-Financial Force financial systems
  • Project management tools
i do not know.
Financial Force has been good to work with from a product/support/services perspective. I don't have insight on how Financial Force is to deal with at a business level.
We received very favorable terms because we were an early adopter. Our biggest concern was financial viability of Appirio and we researched/investigated that aspect of the transaction. Tips: - Ask for a renewal increase cap to protect yourself in long term - Ensure you have a very good, vetted concensus on how you want to operate your business and your priorities for a new PSA system - Ensure you have thought through and budgeted for change management to drive tool adoption
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