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A unique service
for the charity sector

We have joined
Forces for you

Robertson Bell and QX have joined forces to help UK charities reduce accounting costs, optimise operations and improve financial reporting.

CFOs across all sectors have realised UK expensive offices and high back office costs in the post-COVID world are not financially sustainable and the funds can be reallocated to frontline services. There has never been a greater need for charities to drive efficiencies in their business support functions and be creative about how these are achieved.

In response to the many challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic, Robertson Bell and QX have created a unique service offering for the UK charity sector. The new service involves the creation of a dedicated offshore service centre to take care of all your finance and accounting needs.

Combining the best of both worlds

Robertson Bell is one of the UK’s leading providers of Human Capital to the charity and wider not for profit sectors. After having worked with hundreds of leading brands in the sector, the business has built an enviable reputation for quality, reliability and trustworthiness.

QX is an award-winning, outsourcing company with over 2,800 employees, providing a broad range of services in accounting, payroll, and software.

Ever since its establishment in 2003, QX has built a global presence, serving clients across sectors including manufacturing, student accommodation, recruitment, healthcare, media & publishing and accounting in the UK, USA, Canada, Middle East and Australia. QX works at the intersection of finance, technology and operations to help its clients meet their compliance and reporting obligations and to transform processes and improve performance. Leading UK charity Finance Director Stephen Perry (Livability, Mencap, Action for Children and more) has joined the Robertson Bell team to work with QX in developing this solution. Stephen has an immense amount of charity finance department relocation experience and will be instrumental in overseeing the smooth transition of services as well as spotting opportunities for advancing the use of technology to enhance automation.


Outsourcing has been popular for several years for large corporations. But up until now, there was nothing which catered for the nuances of UK charity accounting, together with an offering that can be accessed by charities of any size. We believe this exciting new service to be unique in the UK marketplace.

Our teams have expertise in all areas of charity finance from transactions processing to SORP to donor reporting to partial exemption VAT and more - all at a fraction of the cost of being onshore in the UK. QX’s expertise in offshoring finance and accountancy services and Robertson Bell’s unrivalled network of UK charity accounting professionals ensures that the service levels are comprehensive and high quality by design.

Suite
of offerings

End-to-end accounts payable services

MASTER DATA & DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT

  • Vendor set up / additions
  • Vendor master maintenance
  • Document management
  • Item Creation
  • Restricted Fund management

PURCHASE REQUISITION MANAGEMENT

  • Requisition management
  • Vendor contract verification
  • PO processing
  • Invoice authorisation
  • Helpdesk

INVOICE PROCESSING & VENDOR HELPDESK

  • Matching PO’s
  • Invoice posting
  • Vendor helpdesk
  • Ad-hoc requests

INVOICE PAYMENT

  • Payment run
  • Direct debit / Automated Clearing House (ACH) setup and control
  • Disbursements

REPORTING / ANALYSIS

  • Cost variance analysis
  • Aged creditor reporting analysis
  • Month-end accruals and reporting
  • Supplier statement reconciliation
  • Restricted & Designated Reserves Analysis

Benefits

IMPROVED

  • Cycle Time
  • Cash Posting Accuracy

REDUCED

  • Billing Error
  • Revenue Leakage
  • Bad Debts
End-to-end accounts receivable services

INCOME MASTER DATA MANAGEMENT

  • Donor account set-up and maintenance
  • Service contract set-up and maintenance
  • Other/Ad-hoc income data management

RECOGNISING GRANT / DONATION INCOME

  • Recording Donation / Grant / Gifts / Contribution / Legacies into the accounting system
  • Query resolution related to Grant / Donation / Legacy
  • Restricted and Designated Fund posting and analysis
  • Legacy revenue recognition management and reporting

ACCOUNTS RECEIVABLE

  • Bank Reconciliation
  • Journal posting and AR adjustments

REPORTING / ANALYSIS

  • Budgeting and planning
  • Month and year-end donor reporting
  • Year-end Legacy reporting

Benefits

IMPROVED

  • Cycle Time
  • Cash Posting Accuracy

REDUCED

  • Billing Error
  • Revenue Leakage
  • Bad Debts
End-to-end accounting management reporting

GENERAL LEDGER

  • Preparing and Reviewing Chart of Accounts to align with SORP Guidelines
  • Recognising and classification of Funds under Restricted/ Unrestricted/Endowment Funds as per SORP FRS 102
  • Accrual / Pre-payment Entries
  • Adjustment Entries
  • Review Periodic Expenses
  • Create Period End Accrual Entries

FINANCIAL / MANAGEMENT ACCOUNTS / REPORTING

  • Preparation of Monthly Management Accounts for Managers and Trustees in accordance with SORP FRS 102 Guidelines
  • Preparing Annual Report and Accounts (including all the financial tables but excluding commentary) and work with relevant stakeholders including Auditors
  • Tracking and monitoring restricted income and expenditure and reporting on restricted income balances
  • Donor Reporting
  • Project Accounting and Project Costs tracking

PERIOD CLOSING

  • Reconcile and Close Sub-ledgers
  • Review Accruals / Prepayments
  • Review General Ledger
  • Post final Adjustment Journal Entries
  • Payroll Journals
Cash & bank administration reconciliations & VAT compliance

CASH AND BANK ADMINISTRATION

  • Managing balances in bank for restricted funds and expenses related to charity
  • Cash Management and forecasting

VAT COMPLIANCE

  • VAT Calculations
  • VAT Returns
  • VAT Partial Exemption

RECONCILIATIONS

  • Reconcile Vendor / Donor’s Accounts
  • Bank Reconciliations
  • Reconcile Balance Sheet Accounts
  • Reconcile Restricted Fund Accounts

How QX and Robertson Bell
can enable and benefit you

PEOPLE BENEFITS:

  • Reduced staff salary cost by up to 50%
  • Reduce recruitment cost with no more cost of staff attrition

PROCESS BENEFITS:

  • Process standardisation
  • Continuous process improvement

PLATFORM BENEFITS:

  • Transformation through technology
  • Automation

OTHER BENEFITS:

  • Scalability
  • Stable back-office

Partnering for transformation

A purpose-led partnership enabling your Finance Director, charity management team and Board of Trustees to transform your finance function whilst driving down the cost of finance operations by up to 50%. Furthermore, our consulting team will enable each client to improve current processes, reducing underlying risk and assist in creating the right finance strategy for the Charity.

Leveraging proprietary STEP (Study-Evaluate-Plan) transition methodology, QX has transitioned more than 800 client projects, ranging from 1 to 120+ FTEs. We achieve transition success by focusing on:

Robust transition process underpinned by rigorous planning with jointly defined milestones and staggered waves of transition. Proven approach to migration – Lift-Shift-Transform’ to de-risk the transition.

Deployment of the right knowledge transfer models – client or SME travelling offshore.

Post-transition, the relationship is maintained and nurtured by regular periodic governance calls between the Charity and the QX Operations Team with a Joint Management and Steering Committee.

QX roadmap for transformation

  • 1

    DUE DILIGENCE

    • Study of the “As Is” processes and systems
    • Conduct feasibility analysis
    • Solution designing and “To Be” maps
  • 2

    TRANSITION

    • Setting up the team structure
    • Recruitment of the right resources
    • Knowledge transfer
    • Training
  • 3

    DELIVERY

    • Meeting SLA’s
    • Governance and communication plan
    • Information security
  • 4

    TRANSFORMATION

    • Process re-engineering
    • Centre of Excellence
    • Value add through technology and automation

Providing professional, reliable & secure
outsourcing support through qx’s delivery locations

Bloomfield, NJ, USA
Headquarters: London, Skipton, UK
5 Delivery centres in India (Ahmedabad , Mumbai, Baroda, Noida)
Melbourne, Australia

Partner of choice for
leading UK business