Converting City of Rosenheim to double entry required true pioneering work. As one of the first Bavarian local authorities of this size, Rosenheim wanted to continue its decentralised accounting with the new system. A challenge for users and the supplier INFOMA®, which was successfully overcome within a tight schedule. City of Rosenheim, a city of 60,000 inhabitants, started the Europe-wide tender process for the “Installing Double-Entry" project in summer 2006. One consideration at the time was to link public services and the municipal clinic to the newly created SAP solutions for economic reasons. Analysis of the tender results showed that the organisational connection between a local authority and operations of this nature is actually extremely difficult to accomplish even on an SAP basis. Therefore, systems supplier INFOMA® was chosen at the start of 2007. “The double-entry process newsystem® public fulfilled our evaluation criteria and clearly corresponded to our expectations of such software. Additionally, the price-performance ratio was good”, remembers Heinz Bösl, Head of the Finance Office. The selected package included the double-entry NKR/NKF system including budgeting, product budget, taxes, fees, duties and charges, asset accounting and cost/performance accounting. The timetable for installation was very tight from the start: January 2008 was the target date for live operation. This gave the participants just nine months to get the complex project up and running. A real challenge - City of Rosenheim’s desired localised financial accounting caused some additional work. “We converted to budgeting as early as 1995 as part of government modernisation. This is also one of the main reasons why we have stayed with decentralised bookkeeping. We wanted to leave responsibility with the different departments”, explains Heinz Bösl and adds: “We see that there are significant technical advantages to central bookkeeping. However, even with central bookkeeping we are still reliant on information from the departments. And when I request the information I can also have it entered into the system locally.” Nevertheless, the city used the opportunity to effect partial centralisation: The 80 previous accounts departments have been reduced to 40. Extensive advance work Extensive ground work was required before the premiere of local processing with newsystem® public. This was because the steps required first had to be defined by City of Rosenheim and then entered into the system by INFOMA®. Heinz Bösl describes this part of the project as the most difficult: “This required a lot of time comparatively. First, we had to clarify a few concepts before smooth communication was possible. So it took a while before the key points of the programme were clear and we could tackle them.” In contrast, the city had defined the framework for the account plan early on. Specifications from another local authority’s plan helped, which met Rosenheim’s criteria and were combined with the city’s own existing draft account framework. In retrospect, Rosenheim would have liked more time for the next big step of transferring the old data to the new system: “There was a timetable for the data transfer, which, with hindsight, turned out to be too short. We should have started much earlier with the first test data and then would not have been under so much pressure with the data for business taxes, rates and charges.” However, the right contributions were recorded on the first tax deadline thanks to a joint effort. “The success above all is that no taxpayers were aware of the huge accounting upheaval we were going through", recounts Heinz Bösl and expressly praises the performance of the INFOMA® team and the staff from the Tax Office. Filtering all the important data out of an old system, which has been continually adapted and developed over 25 years, and making them available in the new system is “a real masterstroke” in his opinion. Understanding double-entry Those in charge at Rosenheim felt that giving the 40 affected bookkeepers the best possible preparation for the new recording method was particularly important for a successful conversion to the double-entry bookkeeping system. After basic training on double-entry, just before the start INFOMA® provided a two-day technical introduction to the system as part of a jointly designed training programme. The office and department heads were also informed about the basics of the new system as part of corresponding events. At the same time, the city invited its staff to practise on a test version. Heinz Bösl reports: “Anyone who took up our offer at that time was able to gain a clear advantage over the others and found things that much easier when the system was launched. I can only recommend such a procedure to all new software users.” The “hard” switch to double-entry was also no problem to City of Rosenheim. The increased effort required by the complete change had the inherent advantage that staff only had to get used to a new system once and will not have to switch to a different entry system in two or three years. Heinz Bösl would not shy away from the relatively short conversion period in future either - but with more time for data migration and sufficient additional staff, “because we really reached our limits.” The deadline would not have been met without committed efforts, particularly from staff in the Finance Office. Individual adjustments In addition to the special requirements for localised bookkeeping, INFOMA® realised other adjustments at City of Rosenheim’s request, for example, in reporting. As a result, staff only receive one report, which shows them at a glance what budget is available or how much is already tied up on projects or orders. There had previously been no summary of this information. A peculiarity in the Rosenheim tax department required a further adjustment. The street cleaning fee schedule includes discounts for corner properties and empty land. These are granted cumulatively in part. This had never been a function of newsystem® public before, but this requirement was also realised. Summary City of Rosenheim had one goal in particular when they decided to switch to the double-entry bookkeeping system: they wanted to achieve more financial transparency. The decision makers will receive overviews in future on the commune's financial position and financial development. In future, they will be able to get a reliable answer to the question of “where costs come from for what purpose?”. Rosenheim has chosen the right path with newsystem® public. The authority will see better results each year thanks to continual redevelopment of the programme and features adjusted accordingly, as well as growing experience of the process. However, Rosenheim has already set new goals. These include greater use of cost/performance accounting. Document management is also in focus. The Head of the Finance Office also expects to see tangible relief for staff due to the decentralised organisation of the commune. In addition, a project team will work on centralising the city’s buildings management from mid 2009. This will also require software support. The user City of Rosenheim, Upper Bavaria, 60,000 inhabitants First commune with decentralised double-entry bookkeeping Hard switch to newsystem® public with NKR/NKF system including budgeting, product budget, taxes, fees, duties and charges, asset accounting and cost/performance accounting. Live operation since 1/1/2008

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