CASE STUDY

Surety Title Company

Surety Title Company is one of the largest title insurance companies in New Jersey and a nationwide leader in the title insurance and settlement services. It has 18 locations within New Jersey and Pennsylvania and an extensive network of joint ventures throughout the region. The company commits itself to providing innovative title insurance and settlement solutions through its five divisions (Residential, Commercial, Foreclosure, National, and Joint Venture).

At-A-Glance Results

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Account Code for Multi-Entity Data Analysis
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Hardware Costs for Software Servers
0%
Cloud Software for Operations and Accounting

Client Snapshot

Industry:

Professional Services

Business:

Insurance

Locations:

Pennsylvania, New Jersey

The Challenge

Surety’s on-premise accounting and ERP solution was old-school and behind the times.

Outdated, Uncooperative Software

Surety was using an outdated version of Dynamics GP, an on-premise solution that lacked the benefits of modern software.

Manual Financial Data Management

Since Dynamics GP is a legacy system, the Surety accounting team lacked efficient ad hoc reporting capabilities and had to deal with massive amounts of paper records to process payables.

Time-Consuming Workarounds

To create the reports they needed and manage payroll and payables, Surety’s GP users were forced to implement less-than-ideal workarounds.

Hardware Maintenance

As an on-premise system, Dynamics GP required Surety to maintain physical servers and other complex and expensive hardware.

The Solution

Surety eliminated manual tasks and acquired 21st-century capabilities with Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central ERP.

A Modern Cloud Solution for Operations and Accounting

Surety upgraded to Business Central, a cloud ERP that expands on the core features in Dynamics GP.

Automated Data Management

Surety saves hours each week by eliminating manual data entry and automating data synchronization across the business.

Customizable Workflows

Surety’s new ERP has been tailored to their unique business model, with automations for payment processing and other key responsibilities.

Full Digitization

With a cloud-based ERP, Surety does not have to maintain expensive hardware and can keep all records on an accessible digital platform.

Implementation

Cargas led a guided implementation of Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central for Surety, going live in January 2019 with key integrations.

1: Discovery & Requirements Planning

Surety Title Company's accounting department has financial management responsibilities for five divisions under its holding company, Fenix Holdings, LLC. Because Surety was using an outdated, on-premise version of Microsoft Dynamics GP—a once-popular solution Cargas implemented many years prior—the company's accounting team was struggling to keep up. They had to do a lot of manual payroll entry, lacked efficient ad hoc reporting capabilities, and managed massive volumes of paper records to process payables. 

"We had to develop numerous workarounds to create the reports we needed and manage payroll and payables," explained John Gault, Surety's Controller. "Dynamics GP was using old technology. We had a huge chart of accounts to deal with, and we had to input a lot of data into Excel." 

Gault said that Surety wanted a solution that would stay up to date with the latest functionality while allowing his team to break away from time-consuming manual processes. 

After seeing a Cargas webinar about Dynamics 365 Business Central's capabilities and Microsoft's intentions to focus their efforts on this new cloud product, Surety was ready to make a change. 

According to Gault, "Our relationship with Cargas goes back very far, since implementing Dynamics GP, and we felt confident in moving forward with them." 

2: Implementation and Integrations

In October 2018, Cargas began working with Surety to transition its accounting solution from Dynamics GP to cloud-based Dynamics 365 Business Central. To extend their financial reporting capabilities, they integrated Jet Reports, which provides the flexibility to build reports from inside Excel and access them through Dynamics 365 Business Central. 

The cutover to Dynamics 365 Business Central was completed in January 2019. 

"This year will be spent on integrations to automate more payroll, integrate our CRM, and implement other efficiencies. The next steps will be real process game-changers." 

– John Gault, Controller, Surety Title Company 

During this process, Surety's general ledger was simplified to consolidate P&L statements across its 18 locations (which all have multiple departments). In Dynamics GP, the GL consisted of 35 to 40 account codes per branch to track everything. Through Dynamics 365 Business Central, there's just one account code, and with the Dimensions feature, users can drill down into branch and departmental details. 

Results & Impact

Cargas helped streamline operations across every entity with cloud-based automation, centralized reporting, and lower IT overhead.

Multi-Entity Reporting

With one account code, Surety’s team can easily access data across multiple locations and departments.

Digital Efficiency

Surety has cut down reliance on paper when processing payables, using workflow automation to save time and reduce errors.

Zero Hardware Costs

Since Business Central is a cloud solution, Surety no longer pays to maintain servers or other expensive hardware.

“Our relationship with Cargas goes back very far, since implementing Dynamics GP, and we felt confident in moving forward with them.”

— John Gault, Controller, Surety Title Company

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