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From left to right : Auditel Consultant Stephen Sowerby with Ged Clarke, Kinsella Clarke

Having known Stephen Sowerby from his work as a Chartered Accountant, Ged Clarke was aware Stephen had joined the cost management consultancy Auditel and asked whether Auditel could help his business. Ged was particularly attracted to the contingency fee proposition meaning that there was no cost unless measurable savings were found. As Ged explains, “We run a very busy and successful accountancy practice, and although we keep costs under control, we don’t have the time or resources to consistently monitor these areas. That’s why I was interested in having someone professional that I trust review my overhead expenditure”.

12 months on and the savings have been significant and the service provided by Stephen and Auditel has been dependable, straightforward and honest. Recognising that many of their clients face similar time pressures and find it increasingly difficult to invest resources into overhead spend analysis, Ged and his team are keen to introduce this innovative service to help their clients grow their business by keeping costs under control. Ged is well aware that, “all businesses are having to concentrate resources on strategic growth and so many will be missing out on cost saving opportunities within their essential overheads.”

Although the partnership programme only started recently the initial results have been very promising, already saving Kinsella Clarke’s clients over £35,000 on their overhead expenditure. The feedback from clients on the service has also been very positive with many commenting on the time as well as cost saving. As Ged concludes, “we are always looking for new ways to help our clients, especially in these difficult times, and we are looking forward to introducing Auditel to more of our clients because we trust them to deliver.”

Savings Breakdown:

Telecoms 47%
Electricity 29%
Gas 16%
Stationery 37%

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They provide a technically advanced outsourced accountancy service, delivering business support services such as bookkeeping, payroll and back office services to companies both in the UK and overseas as a cost effective alternative to staffing and funding in house equivalents.

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From left to right : Mark Dennis, Practice Manager, HSC; Gail Clark, Auditel Consultant and David Bishop, Partner, HSC.

Auditel’s Gail Clark first approached Hilton Sharp & Clarke in July 2011 as part of the Partnership Programme to propose adding the Auditel cost, purchase and supplier management service to their existing portfolio.

She was then introduced to Practice Manager, Mark Dennis who, despite some initial concerns, agreed that HSC should give Auditel a try by using themselves as guinea pigs to see how the service worked.

Mark takes up the story, ”We decided to give Auditel a go. We knew our areas of weakness and they were confident they would highlight them.” Gail together with analysis from Auditel colleague Denis Sprague set to work on the stationery and print costs with good effect.

The print costs were complicated by HSC using Barter Card credits that had been paid to satisfy a bad debt. Auditel’s analysis quickly showed that this was not cost effective. Gail comments, “For every one pound of Barter Card credit spent HSC was writing off 100% of the Barter Card credit and paying 50% more in real cash terms!”

As a result of this, the savings achieved on print amounted to a staggering 68% and were backed up by an impressive 43% saving on stationery.

Mark Dennis was delighted. “It soon became clear that Auditel were a company we could work alongside. The audit was done efficiently with very little disruption and their report was first class.

“As a Practice Manager I wear many hats and it was just quite nice to be able to hand one over. Auditel’s involvement has freed me up to concentrate on cash flow, business development work, and developing our marketing plan.”

About Auditel’s Partnership Programme, Mark adds, “We are now preparing joint marketing material and data mining to create a list of clients who we feel would benefit from Auditel’s services.”

Savings Breakdown:

Stationery 43%
Print 68%
Planned: Insurance

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From left to right : Paul Copsey, Auditel; Nick Chaplin, FD, Framlingham College, Tony Mahoney and Stephen Heathcock, Auditel

Nick Chaplin, Framlingham College’s Finance Director first came across Auditel in 2007 via a telemarketing campaign and was attracted by the local, established and recommended service they offered.

Dissatisfied with their previous cost consultants, Nick saw in Auditel the opportunity to have their complex cost, purchase and supplier management handled professionally, thus saving the School a considerable amount of time and money.

“I first invited Auditel to look at our utilities costs. We knew we had not been getting best value from the previous firm of cost consultants and we knew there were better deals out there. But with so many meters to keep an eye on, the process of finding them was beyond us. We simply didn’t have the time, knowledge or buying power required to access them.

“I wanted to make sure we didn’t miss any renewal dates and get rolled over into big expensive contracts. With Auditel on board I hoped we would save time by putting cost management into the hands of professionals, thus making the process quick and easy, and maybe even make some savings.”

Auditel has delivered on all counts. Paul, with fellow Auditel Consultants, Tony Mahoney on energy renewals and Stephen Heathcock on communications, have taken over the cost, purchase and supplier management for the School, freeing up time for Nick’s department, providing accurate management reporting and in the process have made considerable savings.

On utilities they have delivered savings of over £95,000 and refunds for VAT and Climate Change Levy of over £60,000.

Paul and John Heathcock have just completed a detailed lighting survey which promises annual savings of £27,000 and other projects, such as a further review of fixed line communications are well underway, taking total savings to an expected 37%.

Nick is delighted,”Prices have risen dramatically over the last few years and I hate to think where we would be now, if it wasn’t for Auditel.”

Savings Breakdown:

Savings

Electricity £65,000
Gas £19,000
Water £4,000
Fixed line comms £7,100

VAT Refunds
Electricity £32,000
Gas £3,000

Other Refunds
Climate Change Levy £26,000

Total £156,1000

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From left to right : Yiotis Diomedou, FD and Malcolm Toghill, MD, Advanta; and Gail Clark, Auditel Consultant

Auditel’s Gail Clark first approached Advanta in May 2011 to a mixed reception. Her cost management proposal and the Auditel Partnership Programme looked good on paper and Managing Director Malcolm Toghill was keen to see whether the Auditel service could be added to Advanta’s portfolio. However, his Financial Director, who had had previous experience with other cost cutting outfits, was dubious.

Malcolm explains, “We decided to try the Auditel service out on ourselves. The potential value to us was obvious. It sounded like something our clients would be interested in and would give us a great marketing tool, but we decided to ask Gail to look at our costs first and, if satisfied with the whole process, only then would we offer it to our clients.

My Financial Director had a slightly jaundiced view of cost management companies before he encountered Auditel, but he has since been won over completely by the results Auditel have achieved.”

Gail, with the help of fellow Auditel consultant, Denis Sprague, were asked to review Advanta’s spend on utilities, telecoms, stationery, insurance and waste.

Advanta’s business premises are relatively small and their expenditure not massive, but as a test case the results were highly significant.

The actual savings for Advanta amounted to a little over £3000, but as a percentage of their existing spend this translates into impressive savings of 36% on telecoms, 30% on stationery, 25% on electricity, 14% on insurance and 9% on waste.

Advanta recognised the significance of these figures. As a percentage of the larger spend of some of their bigger corporate clients this level of savings would represent a meaningful effect on their business costs.

Malcolm continues, “We will now be launching this service for our clients and using it as a marketing tool to attract prospects.

“But it’s not just the savings that have impressed me. Auditel have saved me so much time, which is really important, allowing me to get on with my real work. They just took the books and got on with it.“

Advanta are now looking forward to working with Gail, by adding the Auditel service to their portfolio as part of the Auditel Partnership Programme.

Savings Breakdown:

Electricity 25%
Telecoms 36%
Stationery 30%
Insurance 14%
Waste 9%

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They are a Managing Partners Forum Top 100 Employer and were finalists for the “Best Employer Award” at The British Accountancy Awards 2011.

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From left to right : Jeremy Gardner, Partner, Roffe Swayne and Gail Clark, Auditel Consultant.

Auditel’s Gail Clark first approached Roffe Swayne with a proposal outlining the potential benefits of Auditel’s Partnership Programme.

Partner Jeremy Gardner recalls,”It wasn’t something we would normally have even looked at, but Gail’s presentation was very convincing and we decided to give it a try.”

In a nutshell, the Auditel Partnership Programme provides an opportunity for accountancy firms to add a ready-made cost, purchase and supplier management service to their portfolio, thus adding value to their existing client relationships and an added benefit to offer prospective clients.

In order to make sure that they would feel confident offering the Auditel service to their clients, Roffe Swayne wanted to try out Auditel’s service on themselves first.

Jeremy explains, ”If we were recommending a service to our clients, we wanted to be sure that the process worked as described and gave the results as promised. We needed to feel the quality of the service and be in a position to look clients in the eye and tell them we had been through the process ourselves.”

So Gail, with the help of Auditel colleague Denis Sprague, set about analysing Roffe Swayne’s utilities and waste disposal costs and swiftly proved that Auditel’s Total Cost of Purchase® approach to cost, purchase and supplier management delivers not only cost savings beyond the buying power of most companies but also an in-depth understanding of the clients actual needs backed up by a detailed findings report, which in itself provides a wealth of useful management data.

Jeremy continues, ”We had worked hard to keep our costs as low as possible, but with their buying power Auditel were able to unlock deals that were out of our reach.”

In the case of waste disposal, Auditel didn’t just find likefor- like savings, but also analysed the type of service they were getting and proposed changes to better fit Roffe Swayne’s needs.

Jeremy adds,”When it came to confidential waste disposal and shredding services, Auditel came up with a proposal that was not just cheaper, but also more appropriate to our needs.”

He concludes,”Having experienced the process first hand, we’re more than happy to refer Auditel’s service to other clients – in fact we already have!”

Savings Breakdown:

Telecoms 30%
Electricity 7%
Waste 41%

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From left to right: Joe Kwaterski Business Development Director and Wendy France, Administrator, Adelphi Care Services;Claire Power-Browne and Richard Grant, Auditel

In these challenging economic times, the majority of organisations are affected directly or indirectly by rising prices and public and private sector cuts and none more so than those offering education and care services. The need to streamline expenditure and ensure that funds are used to invest in core services instead of being wasted on unnecessarily high operating costs is paramount.

Therefore, when Auditel’s cost, purchase and supplier management services were recommended to Adelphi Care Services they had no hesitation in inviting Auditel’s Claire Power-Browne to run the rule over their business expenditure to see whether they could do better with their business costs at any of their four residences, Merrington Grange in Shrewsbury and Highbury, Merrington & Roseville in Wem.

Auditel’s analysis of their expenditure focussed on telecoms, gas, electricity, photocopiers and janitorial costs.

Wendy France, Administrator at Adelphi Care noticed one immediate advantage. “I used to get several cold calls a day from a variety of suppliers offering their services. With Auditel on board I could just pass them on to Claire!”

In the meantime, as a result of their highly detailed analysis and tendering process, Auditel have brought in new suppliers where necessary and delivered impressive savings in all the areas under investigation: a massive 73% for fixed line telecoms at Merrington Grange, 35% on gas at Merrington Grange, Highbury, and Roseville and 32% on gas at Fernlea. Added to this are VAT repayments totalling over £6,000 and a 32% saving on both janitorial costs and photocopiers.

Wendy says,”Adelphi Care Services are delighted with the savings Auditel have made for us.”

Annual savings which will undoubtedly help a little towards funding their expansion plans for a new respite centre and other work in the pipeline.

Savings Breakdown:

Fixed Line Telecoms 73%
Electricity 35%
Gas 32%
Photocopier 34%
Janitorial 32%

VAT repayments
Electricity £5,007
Gas £1,422.65

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Auditel Consultant Stephen Sowerby

They were recommended to Stephen Sowerby from Auditel by one of their accountants, who also utilises their services, in September 2011 and they decided to meet to investigate the opportunity. Although 7 Harrington Street were interested in the contingency fee proposition, it was decided to proceed cautiously and test the service initially with the energy spend of Chambers.

Stephen quickly set about investigating the contracts and current spend and returned within weeks to present his recommendations and findings. A saving of over 30% was found on the gas expenditure, and over 15% on electricity. As Pauline Haines of 7 Harrington Street explains, “Stephen’s work did not simply stop at the recommendation stage, he diligently implemented all of his recommendations with minimum involvement of Chamber staff and then monitors/proves the savings every month.”

Being an extremely busy Chambers, 7 Harrington Street Chambers accounts staff were impressed with the efficiency and professionalism of the service and decided to discuss other areas of investigation with Auditel. It was decided that telecoms and office supplies/stationery expenditure would be worthy of investigation.

“The recommendations report presented was of impressive detail and left no stone unturned”, explained Pauline Haines, “demonstrating a saving of over 51% on telecoms and 41% on office supplies/stationery.” With both of these areas being of critical importance to the smooth running of Chambers, 7 Harrington Street were impressed by the level of independence shown by Auditel, and the willingness to work with current suppliers to find the best, rather than simply the cheapest, solution.

Although the savings found seven months on since the initial report are very significant and great to invest elsewhere in Chambers, the most important benefit to Chambers has been the time saving and peace of mind. As Pauline Haines summarises “Knowing that these essential areas of expenditure are being professionally monitored and maintained, with regular assistance and dialogue provided, frees accounts staff time to concentrate on the demands of running Chambers.”

Savings Breakdown:

Gas 30%
Electricity 15%
Telecoms 51%
Office supplies/stationery 41%
Water 79%

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Following multi-million pound investment it has built a reputation as one of the UK’s finest private aviation companies.

Their Executive Aircraft Handling facility features a dedicated taxiway, apron, two barrel vaulted hangars that cover 6,300 square metres (room to house four Boeing 737’s), a corporate passenger and crew lounge and a 180,000 litre fuel farm. They also provide security screening, VIP catering and accommodation arrangements to airport transfer, aircraft refuelling and hangarage. In addition, you can take a trial flying lesson; learn to fly as a professional; charter a plane or helicopter from its fleet; have your aircraft serviced or repaired; buy or sell an aircraft, or visit the Multilfight café bar with airside views.

Multiflight, with it’s 70-strong team, caters for all sizes of aircraft, from light aircraft to VIP business jets up to 757s and has it’s own VIP 737 available for charter.

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Left to right:Miles Beecham, Finance Director, Multiflight; Auditel Consultants Phil Wilkes and Paul Wilkes

Auditel have been providing cost, purchase and supplier management services to Multiflight since 2002. Originally engaged to review expenditure on energy and telecoms, Auditel’s expert analysis and thorough understanding of Multiflights needs, has led to significant annual savings of 26%.

In addition to reviewing energy renewals on a regular basis, more recently Auditel reviewed Multiflight’s waste expenditure and successfully lowered their costs by no less than 30%.

Miles Beecham, Multiflight’s Finance Director is full of praise for Auditel. ”I have not only benefited from cost savings, but also been able to pass all correspondence from our utility companies direct to Auditel for review. This takes away a great deal of pressure from my day to day workings and enables me to concentrate on other business matters.”

Retrospective negotiation
In 2007, Multiflight were presented with a large gas bill for the previous four years. Although not totally unexpected the size of the bill £135,000, seemed a bit steep. Through analysis of their usage and the prevailing rates over this period, Auditel successfully challenged the amount and negotiated a reduction of around £45,000. They also put in place an agreement to pay the balance over a number of years and secured a saving on their ongoing rate.

Embracing green energy
When their considerable electricity supply, covering the main office buildings and hangers, came up for renewal in 2011, it emerged that Multiflight would be keen to opt for a green energy solution.

Auditel’s Phil Wilkes comments. “Our work identified an option that not only provided a supply from 100% renewable sources, but delivered that with no cost premium compared to “brown” energy.”

The chosen supply was not quite the lowest cost, but once again Auditel’s understanding of the client’s needs delivered a solution that proved to be the best fit with Multiflight’s environmental policy and desire to be as “green” as possible.

Savings Breakdown:

Energy 26%
Telecoms 26%
Waste 30%

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Their clients range from contractors and owner managed small businesses up to medium and large corporates and not for profit and public sector entities. With their accountancy and audit staff together with their chartered tax advisers, Carpenter Box cover almost every aspect of business, from starting up to profit improvement and from tax mitigation to buying and selling businesses.

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Left to right:Kevin Curran, Auditel Consultant; Stuart Noakes, Head of Tax Services, Chris Coopey (in car), Business Development Partner & Practice Director, Kevin Blake, Head of Business Services.

A year ago, Stuart Noakes, Head of Tax Services at Carpenter Box, had already been discussing the possibility of offering cost management services to their clients, when HSBC Regional Director, Kevin Curran, and client left the bank and took up his new career as an Auditel consultant.

Stuart immediately saw a possible opportunity to joint venture with someone he knew and respected and thought Auditel’s service would be a valuable addition to the Carpenter Box portfolio.

Stuart explains, “I knew Kevin’s professional manner would sit well with our clients and thought the Auditel service could work very well for them too, but before that, I wanted to try it out on Carpenter Box to get the client experience first hand.

“I put him in touch with Practice Director, Chris Coopey and told Kevin to treat us like a client and see what he could do for us.”

“We weren’t so much interested in the savings he could make for Carpenter Box, more the client experience of working with Auditel.”

In fact, Auditel’s analysis and recommendations have delivered substantial savings amounting to 30% on electricity, 37% on stationery and 29% on print and served to further strengthen Stuart’s plans to add the Auditel service to their offering.

Practice Director, Chris Coopey is very pleased with the results and intends to create a ‘hub and spoke’ product offering to their clients for those services outside of their core business, with cost management being one of them.

Stuart adds, “The only thing holding us back at the moment is us! We are working on putting a referral methodology together so that we can pursue the opportunities for Auditel. We are particularly looking at companies with high cost bases and all the client relationship managers are now actively talking to their clients.

“We have a number of clients who think they don’t need cost management services. Having experienced the Auditel service first hand, we know they probably do!”

Savings Breakdown:

Electricity 30%
Stationery 37%
Print 29%

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Today, the company owns and runs two of the Island’s most iconic and recognisable tourist attractions: Blackgang Chine, which is the UK’s oldest theme park, and Robin Hill Adventure Park and Gardens, site of the famous Bestival music festival and winner of the Isle of Wight Chamber of Commerce “Tourism & Leisure Business Awards for Excellence” and the coveted “Island Business of the Year Award“ in 2008/2009.
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Left to right:Rob Holgate, Financial Director, Vectis Ventures: Auditel Consultants, Steve Ray and Keith Marsh.

Employing over 120 staff during peak season and attracting over 300,000 visitors across both sites each year, plus a further 55,000 festivalgoers, Vectis Ventures is one of the Islands most successful and important tourism businesses and is considered to be a flagship business that helps form the identity of the Island to a national and international audience.

Like all successful businesses, however, one of the biggest challenges Vectis face is staying on top of overheads, particularly utility costs, which require time and expertise to manage effectively. So, when Auditel Consultants Steve Ray and Keith Marsh approached them in 2008 with a view to providing cost and purchase management services, the Group’s Financial Controller, Rob Holgate, agreed to meet and find out more.

As Rob says, “From our point of view there didn’t seem to be anything to lose by engaging Keith and Steve to manage our gas and electricity costs and two years down the line I’m very happy with that decision. As a family business we re-invest our profits heavily in developing attractions at both of our sites so any reduction in expenditure that can go towards this growth and development of the business is worthwhile, however it’s on the management side that I believe we’ve benefited most from working with Auditel.”

Through these renegotiations Keith and Steve have implemented savings of 50% at the Blackgang Hotel, plus a further 22% and 20% respectively across the Blackgang and Robin Hill theme park site, but, more significantly, they have also overseen the fitting of new meters at both sites and sorted out a number of contract and meter reading issues.

“One of the new meters installed is what is known as a ‘times ten’ meter, which the supplier evidently forgot, so when the first bill turned up it was ten times higher than it should have been. Thankfully, Keith was able to negotiate with the supplier on our behalf to get the bill corrected, saving me hours of work and the company a lot of money! Also, just before engaging Auditel, we tried to change to a new electricity supplier but our incumbent supplier told us we’d left it too late to give them notice which forced us to stay with them and pay higher prices than necessary. However, once Auditel got involved they were able to negotiate much better prices and I know that next time we’ll be in a position to give notice in plenty of time to take advantage of the best deal for our needs. From my point of view it’s a great relief to know that I’ve got access to expertise when I need it and that any problems or issues will be dealt with quickly, without the need for me to get involved directly.”

Savings Breakdown:

Gas and Electricity Costs
-Blackgang Hotel (Office Site) 50%
-Blackgang Theme Park Site 22%
-Robin Hill Theme Park Site 20%
plus rebate from Robin Hill of 25%

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