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Administration 117: Introducing Devon County Council’s New Finance System

Welcome back to a new term!  You may have heard that Devon County Council are replacing our ageing finance system?  Our current system, FINEST and its supporting platform, is over 30 years old and we are the last users globally(!), therefore we are taking this opportunity to make this essential change.

After a rigorous selection process, we will be replacing FINEST with a new, modern, cloud-based finance system, called Unit4.  We will be working in partnership with Embridge Consulting over the next 12 months to implement this new system with an estimated go-live of Summer / Autumn 2024.  There is already some excitement that the new system will allow us to support modern ways of working around finance, make it easier to manage day-to-day financial transactions and improve the way we budget and forecast.

We understand this change could make things slightly different in how maintained schools engage with Devon County Council.  Going forward, we will be engaging with maintained schools to understand how we could make the transition as smooth as possible and identify those areas where we can make things easier and better for you in the future.

We will be sending out monthly updates through this Blog to ensure you know what is happening and the Future Finance Project Team welcomes any questions you may have.   We will be listening!

At this stage, if you have any questions, please email the Future Finance Project mailbox at finance.futurefinanceproject-mailbox@devon.gov.uk.


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