The Client
Consistently ranked in the top 15 in major UK league tables, The University of Lancaster is also one of the world’s top 150 universities in the QS World University Rankings 2024. The university’s campus occupies a beautiful 578-acre parkland site and is proud to be one of only a handful of UK universities with a collegiate system. Lancaster has a diverse community of 16,500 students from more than 100 countries, with over 3900 staff including leading academics from around the globe.
The Challenge
Prior to using Simitive’s product there was a lack of integration between The University of Lancaster’s existing TRAC model and workload models.
The Solution
A strategic decision was made to source software capable of integrating workload data directly into its TRAC model. Paul Farley, Senior Strategic Finance Partner at the University of Lancaster said: “The overriding criteria we used when looking for a solution was that we needed to deliver a robust TRAC model that would integrate with workload software, could save us time, and be fully auditable and compliant with TRAC guidance. Initially, we did parallel testing with a known outcome from previous software to verify Simitive’s ABC product and to check it was sufficiently robust. We found ABC delivered as specified.
“ABC also allows us secondary integration with Simitive’s WAMS product. By having WAMS and ABC alongside each other we can achieve a much better integration of workload into the TRAC model. We can directly import the data which saves us a considerable amount of time.”
The University of Lancaster has used ABC for over two years for TRAC and is also in the process of implementing WAMS.
The Outcome
Iqbal Hasan, Deputy Director of Finance (FP&A) said: “ABC enables an efficient delivery of the TRAC model. It ensures external deadlines are met and that we make a successful TRAC submission. It also means there is data available to help with decision-making.”
Paul Farley agreed: “It delivers what we expected and what was specified.” Iqbal Hasan added: “We also found Simitive to be helpful and knowledgeable. Credit to Simitive because as with the start of any product rollout, we did hit certain issues as you would expect, but they were addressed with efficiency and good solutions were found to complete the project.”