Royal Holloway Students’ Union: Building a future-ready finance function
Royal Holloway Students’ Union (RHSU) sits at the heart of student life, delivering representation, advice, events, societies, and managing multiple commercial venues across campus. Operating in a complex, fast-moving environment, the Union saw its legacy finance systems struggle to keep pace with growth. The team recognised that through technology innovation, manual processes and disconnected platforms could be removed, creating a more efficient finance function.
RHSU partnered with 4PointZero to design and implement a modern, cloud-based finance ecosystem. Together, they shaped a clear vision for seamless system integration, automated processing, robust controls, and multidimensional reporting, enabling real-time insight into performance across departments, venues, and societies.
The finance team relied heavily on spreadsheets, manually transferring sales data from EPOS, Braintree, and MSL systems into their accounting platform. This resulted in duplicated effort, increased administrative workload. Valuable time was devoted to data entry and reconciliation rather than meaningful data analysis. Approval processes were informal, controls were limited, and producing reliable management information required extensive manual effort.
Working closely with 4PointZero, RHSU evaluated a range of leading accounting solutions before selecting three core platforms: Twinfield for secure, scalable accounting and governance, Basecone for automated invoice processing and approval workflows, and Ezora for real-time analytics and seamless daily operational postings. 4PointZero led the implementation rollout, from data migration to system setup and workflow design, supported by bespoke training and a dedicated two-month Hypercare period to support the team and embed new working processes.
The new systems automate many routine tasks, allowing the finance team to spend less time on manual work and more time on strategic activities. As the new system and processes embed, the team have noticed the positive benefits of having an integrated system that supports better decision-making and more effective resource planning through automated management reporting.
“4PointZero provide a level of technical expertise and support that allows us to continue pushing boundaries in how we use financial systems. Their ability to assist at a detailed technical level, while also advising on the broader process landscape, helps us continually improve how we operate."
"Moving to a cloud-based ecosystem has allowed us to work more efficiently and collaboratively, both internally and with our clients. It’s given us the flexibility to adapt to different business needs and has strengthened our ability to deliver high-quality advisory services at scale."
"Working with 4PointZero to migrate our accounts into a cloud-based system felt like being in safe hands, and the ongoing support provided to us has been invaluable in promoting the success of our Digital Consultancy offering to clients."