Episcopal Diocese of Central NY finds easy
answer for financial reporting.

The Episcopal Diocese of Central New York extends from the Canadian
border to the Pennsylvania state line, supporting 11,000 Episcopalians in 85
congregations.

Cathy Hobart, controller for the diocese, is always looking for ways to make
her processes as easy and efficient as possible. In addition to being controller,
Hobart works with the Diocesan Board to oversee the diocesan budget, is the
benefits administrator for the Diocese, and assists parishes with questions
related to payroll, employee benefits, and financial matters. She wears many
hats and needed a solution to help her stay focused on the mission. Her
search led her to Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT, which the diocese adopted
near summer’s end in 2019.

Transition Made Easy

“When making the decision to switch to Financial Edge NXT, I did
some shopping around,” said Hobart. “I looked at my options, did some
comparisons, and decided to talk to my auditors. They knew that Blackbaud
would structurally work for us, and I trusted their recommendation in
conjunction with my own research.”

Hobart found it very easy to transition without a lot of training. “It’s very user
friendly, and I find it easy,” Hobart said. “I can often figure things out without
needing to spend too much time searching for answers. It’s a very intuitive system that seems to flow in a way that makes a lot of sense.”

Financial Edge NXT has made it easier for Hobart to do her job. Because it is
cloud based, there is no need to worry about VPN through a desktop, which
has a tendency to slow efficiency down.

Reports at the Push of a Button

The Episcopal Diocese of Central New York has many reporting needs,
particularly when it comes to annual audits. Financial Edge NXT makes it easy
to figure out cash disbursements, cash receipts, general ledgers, and find
bank records. Hobart says she has about 30 reports saved at her fingertips
that she can access easily at the push of a button. Hobart reports for multiple
companies, so having different levels of reporting for various groups is
crucial.

“With my old system, it would take me a day and a half just to produce a
month’s financial statements,” said Hobart. “With Financial Edge NXT, I can
run the report, export it to Excel, and then just modify it a little, and it’s done.
It takes out a lot of that spurious data entry that I didn’t need to be doing,
and then it eliminates a lot of the error risk.

“Compared to my last system, Financial Edge NXT provides quicker, faster,
more reliable financial reports just by pressing the couple of buttons.”