DSD Construction has adopted three Causeway solutions with the aim of streamlining its processes to increase productivity and profitability. The civil engineering contractor has integrated Causeway Commercial Management (CPA), Causeway Estimating and Causeway Tradex e-invoicing solution with its wider processes, to allow significant gains while ensuring minimal disruption.
DSD Construction, which employs more than 150 people, is a nationwide surfacing and civil engineering specialist that works on highway, rail and nuclear facility projects as well as a wide array of private sector developments. The company wanted to increase the profitability of its contracts with significant growth over the next three years. However, it was important to find a way to achieve these targets without putting pressure on staff and resources. Therefore, efficiency improvements through the implementation of digital technologies were considered to be the best way to transform their business.
Martin Tweddle, Operations Director at DSD Construction commented, ‘As a business, DSD has grown sustainably over the last 30 years. However, within the last decade we have seen a significant change in our needs as well as our clients’ needs as we have predominantly moved from a Tier 2 to a Tier 1 Contractor. This is due to the award of many local authority frameworks within our surfacing and civils divisions as well as some significant awards within our nuclear division’.
Causeway Commercial Management (CPA) was recommended by another business in the sector to help achieve better commercial management. When DSD contacted Causeway, the team arranged a series of ‘discovery workshops’ with key stakeholders within DSD to understand its needs, how the business operated, what the challenges were and how Causeway solutions could provide improvements.
Their ’step up’ resulted in the need for:
- Streamlined and standardised processes within estimating, buying, commercial and accounts departments
- Enhanced project accounting and reporting capabilities
- Greater visibility of cost and value
- Increased governance for budget management
Much of DSD’s estimating, project cost management and invoicing processes were carried out manually, with spreadsheets being used for many of the tasks. The evaluation conducted following the discovery sessions revealed how much time and resource could be saved by adopting specialist software solutions. By demonstrating the cost of continuing with ‘business as usual’, Causeway was able to demonstrate that increased efficiency around the Cost Value Reconciliation (CVR) process could lead to an increase in their profitability by 10%.
Martin said, ‘The award of frameworks and the continuity of works allows us to invest in industry leading systems such as Causeway Estimating, CPA and Tradex. With the right application we can save time and money, whilst applying best practice across the business which we hope will contribute to another 30 years of success for DSD Construction’.
Causeway identified three software solutions that would benefit DSD across the project lifecycle – Causeway Commercial Management (CPA), Causeway Estimating and Causeway Tradex. These three solutions not only improve efficiencies in those specific areas but also integrate fully with each other and previously standalone packages to provide greater visibility and simpler reporting. By integrating with DSD Construction’s current finance system, processes could be enhanced whilst keeping disruption to current operations to a minimum.
The Causeway Estimating solution, designed specifically for construction, helps contractors and subcontractors to manage the bidding and tendering process. It allows estimators to quickly create accurate estimates and draw on information from previous projects, eliminating re-work and improving productivity.
Causeway Commercial Management (CPA) provides fully consolidated cost management, allowing the capture and allocation of all costs including labour, plant, material and subcontractors for improved project cost visibility and decision making. Estimated costs can be compared directly to actual project costs in a single view to help eliminate cost overruns. Intuitive data entry and central data storage eliminates task duplication, saves time and minimises the risk of errors. Causeway Commercial Management also includes access to Causeway Docs, the online document management system to provide centralised storage and easy access to all project related documentation.
With the majority of the projects that DSD works on utilising the New Engineering Contract (NEC) form of contracts, one of the key benefits of CPA is that the solution can provide a breakdown of cost and information in a structure that matches the contract requirements to efficiently capture and manage costs and give real-time visibility on value and profitability.
E-invoicing solution, Causeway Tradex improves straight-through-processing rates by validating invoice information and auto matching it to a purchase order and/or receipt note to make Accounts Payable teams more efficient and to ensure payment terms are achieved. For DSD Construction, the ability for Tradex to fully integrate with its financial systems, including Sage 50, was an important consideration for minimising disruption to day-to-day operations during implementation. This integration also delivers improved data visibility to ensure informed decision making.
‘Causeway have been fantastic to deal with every step of the way and look forward to a great business relationship’.
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