Great Product and Amazing Customer Service!!
March 23, 2016
Great Product and Amazing Customer Service!!
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with Vena Solutions
Vena Solutions is being used agency wide as our primary budgeting tool. Utilizing Vena we have replaced a 24 spreadsheet inter-linked internally developed budget tool. Previously we were unable to allow many users to update our spreadsheets because of the danger of breaking the links but with Vena we are able to include multiple managers in the budget process and allow them to work directly with their people to develop a budget that more accurately reflects reality. To be honest we completed our first budget in Vena this past August. Due to unanticipated funding changes we were notified of in September we had to completely rework the budget in less than a month and were able to do so. Vena allows us to shorten our budget process significantly and produce more dependable and accurate results. We are required to submit budgets with the many funding requests we prepare...mainly to government agencies. Vena will allow us to more easily create these budgets based on our overall agency budget. By using scenarios we can use existing budget data to produce these new and updated funding budgets.
- Maintains integrity of front end spreadsheets because inter-linking the various templates is done outside of Excel.
- Allows us to import data directly from our accounting and payroll system to populate templates.
- Provides flexibility through multiple scenarios ....allowing several versions of a budget to exist concurrently.
- Template control allows us to engage multiple managers in the process, each working on their own program template without impacting the work of other managers.
- Sometimes developers do not get a clear idea of what is needed before attempting to design a solution.
- Because the system design allows for such flexibility it can be difficult for support to fully understand what my issue is. No two budgets are designed exactly alike so it is understandable that troubleshooting can be a challenge. Having said that...I have never encountered a more supportive and helpful support staff.
- In my opinion the process of rolling forward budget versions and scenarios is not intuitive and seems cumbersome.
- We are experiencing decreased time spent in our annual budget process. Since we have only completed our first budget (although done twice) we have not established a track record but the process has been smoother and quicker.
- Less manual entry means fewer mistakes.
- The same base data is used for multiple budgets and scenarios allowing us to be more consistent across the board. We can create more accurate projections. We are also able to do respond more quickly when needing to look at a various scenarios when experiencing funding changes...both positive and negative.
The main contender with Vena was Prophix. Most of the other products we looked at were not capable of the complexity we needed. We chose Vena because the Excel templates made it look like the budget we were working with. We were able to use syntax we were familiar with for formulas and achieve the desired results. We knew any product was going to be a challenge but Vena was the appropriate choice for us.
Vena Feature Ratings
Using Vena Solutions
16 - Finance, Executive Management, Social Services Division and Program Management
2 - CFO and COO. COO has really good Excel and logic skills. We use an external tech support group to maintain our server and upgrades.