Lempäälä Property Maintenance and Technology LEKITEK Oy is an in-house company belonging to the Lempäälä Municipal Group, which is responsible for the cleaning, property maintenance, construction, green and sports facilities services of the municipality of Lempäälä.

Lekitek employs around 120 professionals and its turnover in 2022 was around EUR 8.5 million.

The participatory budgeting model involving business line managers and the will to update financial planning tools to modern times challenge the quality standards of financial planning and reporting in a new way

Before Finadeck was introduced, reporting, budgeting and forecasting at Lekitek was mainly done in Excel, where the figures for the business areas were brought together from different tabs using formulas. The budget data was then transferred to the financial management software as a csv file.

The head of each business area was already involved in the budgeting of their own business area, which meant that the possibility of errors in Excel became too high. In the forecasting process, all forecast data was generated in Excel by manually transferring the forecast month data from the financial management software into Excel, which was then combined with the forecast from the end-of-month budget.

Reports and graphs for the board, among other things, were also previously generated in Excel. "In addition to saving time and money and raising quality standards, we also wanted to produce a positive and modern employee experience for our employees in the area of financial planning," says Samuli Solmio, Managing Director of Lempäälä Property Maintenance and Technology LEKITEK Oy.

Screenshot of a lacquer report of cost centres built in Finadeck

Ready-made interfaces, versatile functionalities, ease of use, cost-effectiveness and a service approach that takes into account development requirements were the key factors in

Lekitek conducted an in-depth analysis of several financial planning and reporting software options before deciding which software would best serve their needs. "We chose Finadeck because of its pre-built interfaces, extensive functionality, clear implementation and pricing, ease of use, and their development-oriented attitude. We also found it to be the most cost-effective of all the alternatives." Solmio says. Lekitek also wanted the software to be able to handle the reporting, budgeting, forecasting and consolidation needs of the entire Lempäälä Municipal Group in the future.

Since the launch, Lekitek and Finadeck have designed some functionality together using a partner model, which has enabled Lekitek to get the additional functionality it wanted in Finadeck, and at the same time enabled Finadeck to develop its software to better meet the needs of its customers.

For example, with the ability to comment on budgeting and forecasts, Lekitek and other Finadeck customers can comment on budget and forecast cells and view the budget and forecasts for all business areas centrally.

In the picture from left to right Saku Pöllänen, CEO of Finadeck Oy and Samuli Solmio, CEO of Lempäälä Kiinteistöhuolto ja -tekniikka LEKITEK Oy.

"We have been able to streamline and at least halve the time spent on monthly financial planning and reporting that was already required"

Before the switch to Finadeck, Lekitek spent between two and four man-days per month on reporting and updating forecasts. With the introduction of Finadeck, most of the reporting has been automated, with business area managers receiving a monthly report for their business area in their email. In addition, Lekitek will automate the reporting of the management team and the Board of Directors with Finadeck. With open accounts data automatically updated from the financial management software to Finadeck every night, the data is almost real-time and there is no need to worry about manual errors in reporting.

The risk of manual error and formula errors has also been eliminated in the budgeting and forecasting process. During the implementation of Finadeck, access restrictions were defined for each business area manager, allowing each business area manager to edit the forecast for their business area. In addition, Solmio and Aino-Kaisa Marttila, Finance Manager of Lempäälä Kiinteistöhuolto ja -tekniikka LEKITEK Oy, can also view and edit the budgets and forecasts of all business units from the central view.

Screenshot of the centralised editing view of the budget and forecast

With the actual data automatically updated to the forecast and the forecast data after the actual months completed in Finadeck, the unnecessary manual Excel jump for data transfer has been eliminated. During the implementation training, Finadeck built together with Lekitek a detailed manual for budgeting, forecasting and updating according to a defined budgeting and forecasting process, which makes it easier for each business area manager to update the forecast of his business area in Finadeck. "We have already streamlined and at least halved the time spent on monthly financial planning and reporting and we believe that the time and cost savings will continue to increase." Solmio concludes.

The roll-out went well and the development requests have been taken into account

At Lekitek, the implementation of Finadeck went very well and the development proposals have been taken up for processing, development and production as agreed and within the agreed timeframe.

Since Lekitek introduced Finadeck, the implementation has also been promoted with other companies belonging to the Lempäälä municipal group. "We continue to be pleased with our choice of Finadeck as our financial planning and reporting software. I am happy to recommend Finadeck and the service we receive to other companies and municipal groups", Solmio concludes.