It took Veolia Transport, with over 100 years of public transport operations experience in 25 countries, little time at all to figure Greentree was exactly what they needed to help transform Auckland’s rail system into a modern, efficient and integrated public transport service.

The New Zealand operation of Veolia Transport felt less than confident about using the package being used by their international counterparts because of the importance they placed on issues such as reliable local support. They had heard about Greentree through word-of-mouth and the vibes were unanimously very positive. Greentree’s local support partner would provide the expertise to implement the standard business management system, develop bespoke solutions and provide ongoing help-desk support.

“We knew exactly what we were looking for: we required a locally supported yet highly capable financial product with the ability to be tailored to suit our needs,” says Financial Controller Albert Giorgini.

Strong reporting engine

After a detailed demonstration, the whole management team saw Greentree as the ideal system for their requirements and future plans. “We liked what we saw - Greentree is very user friendly and flexible, and the reporting tools really stood out for us,” Giorgini says. “We felt Greentree had the nous to provide a strong reporting engine to enable us to satisfy our management needs and future business changes.”

Giorgini says Coda, the package Veolia uses internationally, produces good end reports but it is extremely complicated to actually produce the report, whereas reporting with Greentree is simple. “Click, click and drag, and you’ve set up your own template. It’s a very big plus”. The reporting is very powerful and helps maintain high productivity and the functionality of Greentree is comparable to much larger more expensive systems.

Veolia could have paid tens of thousands of dollars to get SAP installed” but when they compared the functionality and scope of Greentree, Giorgini says “ Installing SAP would have been a major overkill.”

Veolia uses Greentree’s Accounts Payable/Receivable, General Ledger, Cash Management, Purchase Orders and Fixed Assets modules across all elements of their operation including remote based stations. All the information is captured and processed within Greentree from the ticket desks to financial accounts. Giorgini says “despite the significant volume of transactions Greentree has never fallen over, the system has proved to be very robust and stable.”

“We know always know exactly where we are with Greentree’s smart integration and strong reporting engine. I’ve had previous experience of other packages and I soon realized Greentree was just the ticket for us.”

- Albert Giogini, Financial Controller, Veolia Transport

Smooth, on-time and within budget

Giorgini says the company has built a reliable product with excellent support and additional professional services. “Greentree is a great fit for our business; we understand why it has a strong reputation in New Zealand.”

He says the implementation went very well. “They were focused on meeting our specific requirements and were prompt to deliver the fine tunings we needed. Their staff are very proactive and the outcome has been a great success. One of the key elements is that the team delivered the system in time for us to go live. They understood our goals and met the timeframe and budget.”

‘Just the ticket’

An interesting feature being exploited by Veolia Transport is Greentree’s ability to use a Scanning module. Invoices are scanned and saved in the system, which means when you have a query and drill down to an invoice, a copy of the physical invoice is attached. This saves Veolia staff a measurable amount of time because they don’t need to go looking for the paper version of the invoice. Giorgini says “the flexibility of Greentree and skills of the support team really came through in the modification of the inventory system.”

Following Veolia Transport’s specifications, the implementation team custom built a Fare Revenue ticketing inventory system from the Inventory module. The team devised a methodology to make Greentree software the “engine” for the system and created purpose-built screens to handle the data entry and reporting to review ticket sales. Discrepancies are a serious issue and a major part of the auditing of the system, so it was vital that the reporting of money collected in Greentree was highly accurate.

“The support partner team were very good at helping us out when we were in a corner with the ticket system,” Giorgini says. “They worked very hard to get it done effectively and efficiently.”

During the time Veolia have been using Greentree local patronage has doubled, with more growth expected. As the rail network continues to be improved and upgraded in the Auckland region, Giorgini believes Veolia Transport has chosen the right software for the task ahead. Greentree has improved up-to-the-minute access to financial figures for Veolia business managers and Giorgini is positive that “Greentree will scale as we need it and the benefits will continue as our business grows.”

About Veolia Transport

Veolia Transport is one of the world’s leading private operators in the passenger transport sector, providing urban, suburban, inter-city and regional passenger services on buses, trains, trams and ferries.

Operating in 25 countries around the world, Veolia Transport has more than 73,300 employees worldwide and carries over 2.5 billion passengers to their destinations every year. Veolia Transport specializes in the delegated management of public transport services; working on behalf of over 5000 local, regional and national government authorities around the world.

Veolia Transport Australia is the largest private land transport provider in Australasia, operating the suburban rail network in Melbourne; monorail, light rail and buses in Sydney, buses in Brisbane and Perth and the passenger rail network in Auckland, New Zealand. Veolia Transport is the transportation division of global environmental company Veolia Environnement.

For more information visit: www.veoliatransport.co.nz