Speakers: Peter Cowan, Senior Audit and Accounts Manager, Hall Morrice LLP
Peter Cowan: Hi there. My name is Peter Cowan. I'm one of the senior managers here at Hall Morrice in the audit and accounts department. My main role at the firm is client facing, but also recently, I've taken up the role of digitisation, which Glasscubes is a massive part of, trying to move away from manual systems, emails, and then try and getting us to use one system for all our apartments, which helps us move into the 21st century.
Before using Glasscubes, how did you request information from clients, and what problems or frustrations did that cause?
Peter Cowan: Prior to us using Glasscubes we used several different ways to request information. You know, things such as posting out letters, using the CCH portal [OneClick], emails, Excel requests and emails, and we just had too many, we needed to merge into one system. And that's what Glasscubes has, because with various issues where clients would forget that they've received something message would get lost in the post. They'd also only answer half our questions on, on our Excel request lists, or they miss, tabs, if we had things over several tabs, and it meant that we didn't know what information had been requested, and when it had been requested, and clients really just abuse that by not giving us information, or blaming it on ourselves, and realistically that's what Glasscubes has fixed.
Did you have any concerns about moving to a new solution like Glasscubes, and were any of these subsequently realised?
Peter Cowan: Our main concerns when moving to Glasscubes were first of all staff training. Would staff actually take the portal on board because they are used to using other methods and similar appliances, trying to make sure they actually use the system, because they're so used to using other systems for years that we've had in place. Overall, I don't think these frustrations and concerns have really come to fruition. You know most clients much prefer Glasscubes. They know there's one central portal for all their homeowners needs. So whether they're using audit, accounts, or payroll, or even personal tax, they know everything is in one place, which is fantastic, and all our staff, have loved it. We've been on a digitisation journey here at Hall Morrice, Glasscubes is a massive part of it, and it's probably the best solution we've had for information for our staff. I don't think any of them would want to go back to using emails and spreadsheets and things like that.
Please describe working with us. How has Glasscubes helped you, your firm, and/or your clients?
Peter Cowan: Working with Glasscubes has been a fantastic experience. Our client managers are really good at their job, as they listen to us, they help us, if we have any queries, they come back to us. The Glasscubes help itself is a really good programme. But I think it's also helped our clients, they now have one place, they know where the information request is. We can list out the requests. Everyone can see it, whether it be clients, ourselves, managers, or partners, all know that there's one place where the requests are and they can see what is outstanding. So when the client comes back and asks us, "What have we still got to do?" Well, they go to Glasscubes. That's our first answer, and everyone's on the same page. There's none of this. Oh, we haven't got this, or haven't got that, because it's right there in front of us. And it also let's us go back to a specific request. If they haven't provided the information, it lets us go back to them on that request without sending out a brand new request form, which clients don't like.
Peter Cowan: To anyone watching this, I would highly recommend using Glasscubes if you're looking for a new information requesting system. For us, it has been brilliant. The greater transparency has really helped us. The team at Glasscubes are also really, really good at responding to us or any queries. They're helping us build forms and it's never too late to change. We change quite late in our audit year, but the clients love it. So you know it's never too late to change and if you want something that is transparent and everything is in one place, then I'd use Glasscubes, I would say come and speak to us, or them even, sorry, because they'll be able to build you something really quickly and get it rolled out across your team even quicker.
