Westminster City Council selects asset4000 from Real Asset Management to control its £2.3bn asset base

Westminster City Council, the local authority serving the heart of London, has selected Asset4000 to manage its £2.3bn worth of assets. Asset4000 provides the Council with a centralised asset register which ensures the detailed level of component accounting required for IFRS compliance, whilst also enabling the authority to minimise errors and save administration time.

The top scoring City Council, which gained maximum points in 4 out of 5 categories under the CPA (Corporate Performance Assessment) 2007, includes the capital’s principal areas of government, shopping, entertainment and tourism, with an estimated one million people passing through the area each day. Westminster’s fixed assets total more than thirteen thousand and include operational properties, council dwellings, vehicles, plant and equipment, investment and commercial assets, community assets, assets under construction and 110 acres of parks and open spaces.

A key driver for selecting RAM’s Asset4000 to manage these assets was compliance with IFRS legislation. John Parmenter, Financial Controller for Westminster City Council, comments, “Prior to purchasing RAM’s software we used spreadsheets for capital accounting. This was sufficient until recently, when the complex capital accounting arrangements introduced through the Statement of Recommended Practice (SORP) and the IFRS transition from UK GAAP made it necessary to purchase an asset accounting system which was readily adaptable to meet all accounting requirements.”

Parmenter continues, “We considered other software solutions to assist with fixed asset accounting and IFRS conversion. Through following our procurement procedures, which include scoring assessments, RAM was selected as the most suitable product to purchase. This, together with the fact that Asset4000 has been tried and tested by other organisations similar to Westminster City Council, meant that RAM’s offering stood apart.”

The Asset4000 system is designed to assist with SORP and IFRS compliance for local government bodies with features including generation of revaluation reserve entries, calculation of historic and revaluation depreciation, maintaining audit trail records on historic impairment and allowing component valuations and accounting. Parmenter adds, “The centralised control will make things easier to manage and reduce the risk of error significantly. We also expect that Asset4000 will help us save time when producing the year-end Statement of Accounts through the generation of all balance sheets and revenue entries on fixed assets. The audit trail functionality will also help us improve responses to audit queries, as well as ensuring our readiness for component valuations and accounting entries.”

Parmenter concludes, “RAM’s existing working relationships with similar authorities made our decision to purchase the system all the more easy. They are very professional, with excellent knowledge of the sector and were able to offer the most suitable product to meet all of our requirements as well as those laid out by SORP and IFRS legislation.”

About Real Asset Management

Real Asset Management is a leading provider of fixed asset management and logistics software & services.   Over the last 25 years its products have been implemented by more than 3,000 organisations in over 70 countries.

RAM, one of the leading suppliers to the UK public sector, has successfully implemented software across 1000 Commercial companies, 150 Central Government sites, 200 NHS Trusts, 90 Educational Establishments, 100 Local Authorities and Housing Associations and over 250 MoD sites worldwide.

The company has developed a powerful array of software modules around a central data repository that enables organisations of any size to manage every aspect of the asset lifecycle.   Its Series4000 solution offers fixed asset accounting, capital project control, lessee asset accounting, asset budgeting, help desk management, inventory control, asset tracking, maintenance management and capital allowance calculations.