When emergency response technology manufacturer TacMed Solutions purchased high-fidelity simulator manufacturer TraumaFX in 2019, combining accounting systems into a single DCAA-compliant system was of utmost importance.
At the time of purchase, TraumaFX was using QuickBooks for its accounting.
“QuickBooks wasn’t sufficient to handle what we needed for the government side of our business,” explained Lori Brockway, Senior Operations Manager for TacMed – SSG. “Two of us who came over from the old company understood the importance of government compliance, and we were extremely nervous about an audit. So, the main thing we wanted in a new accounting system was to make sure that we were DCAA compliant.”
Because TacMed had already integrated into NetSuite the previous year, the company sought a NetSuite module that would assist with DCAA compliance and increase efficiency in the accounting systems. Daston’s SuiteApp for NetSuite users, which focuses on DCAA compliance, stood out immediately to Brockway and her team. After speaking with several happy Daston customers, TacMed ultimately selected Daston.
“Daston’s SuiteApp module had lot of the tools we needed,” Brockway explained. “If you want to be DCAA compliant and in NetSuite, Daston offers the best solution. In addition, it is much more economical than competing solutions, which appealed to us, being a smaller company.”
At the time that TacMed purchased TraumaFX, they were not doing indirect cost calculations or looking at rates, Brockway explained. However, Daston’s processes were automated, and the company brought TacMed into government compliance, taking a big weight off the team.
Better Efficiency
Besides assisting TacMed with DCAA compliance, Daston also has helped the company’s accounting team become more efficient. Prior to moving to Daston and NetSuite, TacMed was using two systems: QuickBooks for the accounting side, and GHG for payroll. Daston integrated those functions into its systems, and now TacMed is using NetSuite for both processes. This integration has cut down on the need to log in and out of disparate systems, because all the data resides in one place.
“We needed to run specific reports and to make specific processes for what we have to do. The Daston team wrote us a lot of customized reports that have helped us really be more efficient,” Brockway said.
She explained that in the past, it would take an hour to 90 minutes to pull a report, compared to just 10-15 minutes today.
Brockway said that another huge timesaver happens when the team creates a new project, because each project they do is a multiple-level project with multiple legs associated with it. For instance, if one contract is for a project in 16 locations, it will have a minimum of 32 legs associated with it. Using the tools function in the Daston module, TacMed copies the top level, renames it to the lower level, then simply edits the fields.
“It saves a ton of time,” Brockway said. “I love that. If I had to do manually without copying, it would take me forever.”
Brockway also loves the project status report that shows the ledger by customers, which is helpful when people have questions about cost posting on a project. She simply clicks on the customer, and it populates the details. If there is a line for labor, clicking on the dollar amount will bring up all journal entries. This allows TacMed to see if they are making a profit on projects, whereas before they never had a clear picture of where they were making money, Brockway said.
“Prior to using the Daston module, I was stressed to the max and pulling nine- to ten-hour days,” she said. “Now I feel I have a week to ten days where I can spend my time reading and analyzing reports so that we can make better business decisions. Compared to what we were doing, it is night and day.”
Want to learn more about how Daston can help you with DCAA compliance while making your company more efficient? Contact us today!