Building on Solid Foundations
DRIVE by Relate provides this platform for practice growth.

Starting a practice is never easy. The first clients are the hardest to find and when they begin to arrive quickly you have to adapt to be able to service them, while fulfilling promises that have been made to existing clients. This involves continually assessing staff and operating system requirements so that you are ahead of the game,
not chasing it.

When David Breen started his own practice, David M Breen & Co, his business model was based on growth in client numbers and expanding staff to fulfil these jobs. After two years David realised client communications had to stop being stored in his mind or filed in notes and he needed a cost effective customer relationship management solution that would allow him to centralise client data, coordinate his practice functions, improve tracking his client deadlines/activities & help his staff streamline their time, service and productivity loads.

Following on from the success of his previous implementation of Relate Company Secretary, David decided to expand further into the Relate product suite by purchasing DRIVE to centralise all his client data.

David M Breen & Co. have been using DRIVE for over a year now and they enjoy a wealth of benefits including powerful tracking of client activities, streamlined time & billing, integrated document & deadline management and complete financial management for the practice. He believes no system makes a perfect practice all the time, but if there is going to be a problem, DRIVE will identify it quickly before it happens.

Business Situation David M Breen sought a new CRM solution that would manage his growing client base and make it an integral part of his business. Solution David Approached Relate, A Microsoft Certified partner, and decided on DRIVE, which would centralize his entire client information. Benefits “Each time I look at DRIVE I notice more and more functionality which we have yet to use. We have implemented all of the features of the core product and it is now an integral part of the day to day running of our practice”. David M Breen

Situation
David Breen was the 1st ever accounting technician in Ireland to qualify as a Chartered Accountant. He completed his articles at Phelan Prescott & Co in Dublin and moved to KPMG thereafter. Invaluable system experience was gained in industry during seven years with Liffey Meats Group, a year with the Ryan hotel group PLC and also working with Transport Components as a parts distributor in the motor industry for five years.

Seeking a better quality of life for his family, David moved with his wife and three children to his native Waterford. David soon learned that the demands of practice meant that he had yet to master the work-life balance due to strong commercial growth in Waterford. Initially David picked up management accounts work from a former employer and one other new client off the street who was four years in arrears in accounts and tax.

With a small level of marketing experience & some networking in the local rugby club and charitable organisations, David began to get some success. His main strengths were his marketing focus, experience from his commercial background and an IT competency which enabled him to advise his clients/potential clients. David mapped each business as to where they could be assisted on a financial, sales & marketing and IT infrastructure basis. This proved an excellent combination.

“After market research and the proven success of Relate Company Secretary, we decided on DRIVE to encompass all of our client information” David M Breen

Required Infrastructure
David identified the way forward for the Practice was through
management via appropriate software packages & compliance tools. At practice commencement, he invested heavily in infrastructural hardware and bought a complete suite of products. It became apparent after two years, due to a lack of integration, that the management of separate databases was becoming an increasing burden as the practice expanded.

David explained, “We clearly identified a shortfall in the existing business products we were using. After two years in practice with the tax year end approaching, the client base growing and staff levels increasing, we embarked on market research to find solutions that would help see the practice grow in the 2 – 7 year phase”.

David needed a programme that would facilitate the growing practice, soon to move to new offices at the cit landmark, Maritana Gate. That package would have to be understood by his staff and provide a solution that would improve greatly his customer relationship management tools and software to operate an efficient and rapidly growing business. David needed to update his client information accurately and efficiently on a daily basis. The first product David acquired from Relate was the Company Secretary package with which he had great success. In addition to meeting the basic and advanced Company Secretary requirements, they became the first Practice in Ireland to electronically file an Annual Return with the CRO. David was delighted with the local and national press coverage his firm received and thus it increased the profile of the firm. The CoSec Package success gave David the confidence to select Relate in providing the critical overall Practice Management Product.

Solution
DRIVE from Relate delivered a solution that centralized David’s entire client information into one easy-tomanage system. As the system was built for accountants it contained all the features and functionality required and is tailored to suit the needs of a growing practice.

Benefits to David M. Breen &Co
The DRIVE system that David integrated into his firm will now facilitate his growing business and allow for expansion to any size anticipated. As the current market is very challenging, the quality of the firm’s systems are even more important.

“DRIVE allows us to effectively track client activity. It suits the hardware profile of a medium sized firm and my staff enthusiastically bought into it when they saw the benefits in helping them to do their job better. With the detailed time recording system and the facility to enter notes on each transaction, we were able to appreciate all the activity carried on behalf of a client and more importantly explain it to our clients. Reports detailing each time entry and each phone call or email were easily extractable.This was critical for the pricing of jobs and quite quickly we were identifying the profitable and unprofitable
jobs rather than just chasing Fee turnover.

Also the recording of all clients, revenue and other communications has meant the quality of service to clients increased almost instantly.“

What technology is it built on?
DRIVE is the first package in Ireland and the UK developed using C# and ASP.Net for the Microsoft.Net Framework. Unlike suppliers with legacy software that have been patched together for partial integration, DRIVE has been written from the ground up. DRIVE utilises a single MS SQL Server database to enable accountants’ streamline their processes and client interactions. DRIVE integrates with MS Exchange, MS Word, MS Outlook and MS Excel.

DRIVE contains ten primary modules: Communications Management; Document Management; Deadline Management; Marketing; Job Planner; Financial Ledgers; Purchase Ledger; Time & Expenses; Billing Management and Client Accounting.