Meantime IT

Automated payment system saves two days a week for Entrust MD - Jan 2010

Investing £7500 into a bespoke payment system from Meantime IT has freed up two days each week for a Midlands based managing director of an SME, as well as saving him £20,000 in overheads each year.

And since the software has been installed, managing director of Entrust Social Care Ian Brindley has been able to quadruple the number of fee-earning staff on his books, with no extra administration costs.

Entrust Social Care is a temporary employment business for social workers operating within the public sector in the Midlands and north-west of England. Now with over 3000 social workers on its database, with over 100 placements ongoing at any one time, the company has grown beyond recognition since it was formed in 2002.

"The basic spreadsheet system I was using to pay my locums was proving far too time consuming as the agency grew," says Ian. "I was spending more than two days a week just checking timesheets and processing payments, and on top of that, there was only limited validation – it was subject to human error, and with the volume of data I was inputting that was a very real risk."

So Ian contacted bespoke software developers Meantime IT, and the system the company developed for Ian automated his business processes, leaving him free to concentrate on fee-earning tasks and enabling him to increase the number of concurrent placements from his bank of locums from 25 to over 100 in just four years.

Fenner Pearson is Meantime’s managing director. "Ensuring that the locums are paid promptly is one of the most important aspects of Entrust’s business so Ian felt it was something that he had to do personally," he says. "Yet unfortunately manually inputting the necessary details – basic time, overtime, expenses, bonuses – meant time Ian was tied up with boring, repetitive and time consuming work instead of managing and expanding his company."

"So we spent time with Ian to find out exactly what he wanted to be able to do, then designed a database that would store every detail Ian needed about his clients and his locums; pay rates, tax rates, contract details – everything. Then we created a very simple user interface which would allow him to simply select the locum, choose the client they were working for, enter the number of hours they’d worked and add in any expenses. Then, all Ian had to do was press a button to obtain a single report that gave the details of all the payments required for each locum."

As a result of his automated systems, Ian was able to slash the time he spent on administration from two days a week to just two hours, as well as providing him with vital management information within seconds.

"Meantime’s system has saved us a significant amount of operational overheads and saved me at least one member of administration staff, to the tune of at least £20,000 each year" says Ian. "Without it, we simply wouldn’t have been able to expand the way we have. Now, we have seven recruitment consultants, over 100 locums on placement and 3000 on the books, and just two administration staff – incredible when you consider the amount of information we have to process each week."

And, as Entrust continues to grow, so do the demands on the administration systems. "The beauty of our software is that, because it was designed specifically for us, we can add to it whenever necessary and it will adapt and grow with us," says Ian. "And, more importantly, we haven’t had a single second of downtime since it was implemented."

Meantime provides online shop for world-famous Beatrix Potter attraction - Jan 2010

Meantime IT has been appointed to provide the World of Beatrix Potter™ Attraction with a new e-commerce site to sell its licensed Beatrix Potter merchandise.

The World of Beatrix Potter, based in Bowness-on-Windermere, Cumbria, is an internationally renowned tourist attraction which welcomes around 150,000 visitors per year and its e-commerce operation has been shipping to international customers since 2005.

With an increased focus on online sales for 2010, and an expanded range including the newly-licensed Peter Rabbit bed linen, general manager Richard Foster brought in Meantime to create a new e-commerce site.

“We’ve successfully used Meantime for our websites in the past and so they were the obvious choice to create our new e-commerce site,” says Richard Foster. “We wanted to improve the site to provide a better experience for our customers, but also for us as an organisation. Functionality is incredibly important, and we need to know that we can rely on our e-commerce software to operate smoothly and give our customers the sort of experience they would expect of a world-famous attraction.”

As well as providing an e-commerce platform aimed at a worldwide audience, the contract will see Meantime host the e-commerce operation on its in-house servers, meaning that the online shop will be automatically PCI compliant.

“Remaining PCI compliant can be a full-time job in itself, with the amount of updates and requirements that are issued on an almost daily basis,” says Fenner Pearson, Meantime’s managing director. “Because all Meantime’s servers are fully PCI complaint, any client that develops and hosts their site with us will automatically comply for e-commerce as well, completely freeing them from a whole minefield of regulations.”

As well as ensuring the highest level of compliance and safety, the enhanced e-commerce site Meantime is building for World of Beatrix Potter will enable the organisation to expand its global operations. “We’ve developed the platform with a global audience in mind, in that the functionality within it is incredibly complex. For example, it takes into account the variables associated with global shipping requirements relating to weight, destination, VAT and so on.

“Richard and his team are adding new licensed products all the time, and we’ve provided software that will grow with the range and cope with the increased sales that will result. We’re confident that the fantastic range on offer combined with the increased functionality of the e-commerce site will see sales of merchandise go through the roof.”

Richard Foster agrees. “As well as helping us to increase sales through the website, our new e-commerce site will provide a much more pleasant and efficient service for our customers. The quality of our website reflects the quality of our attraction, and with such a globally-recognised brand as Beatrix Potter we are confident that Meantime will deliver an e-commerce site that will live up to expectations.”

Meantime hosts Vince Cable's first public appearance in South Lakes - Nov 2009

Vince Cable, the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, will be in Kendal on Saturday 28 November to meet members of the business community and hear first hand the issues which affect them, in a rare opportunity for business leaders to discuss their concerns directly with the people who can influence policy.

Joining him at the event, which will be held at the offices of Kendal web development company Meantime IT, will be Tim Farron, MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale. Both MPs will address the assembled business leaders to deliver their vision for the future of local business, as well as their policies on the wider economy. The presentations will be followed by an informal question and answer session, and the opportunity for one to one discussions with both Vince and Tim.

Mr Cable was one of the first MPs in the UK to warn of the impending global financial disaster. During an appearance on BBC2's Newsnight with Alastair Darling and George Osbourne, he was introduced by Jeremy Paxman as "the one MP who understands the British economy."

"The Liberal Democrats are an authoritative voice on both local and national business issues," says Tim Farron. "It is incredibly important to both Vince and I that we work closely with the business community to tackle the real issues that are affecting them, and this event will enable people to come directly to us with their concerns and feedback."

The event will be held at the offices of development company Meantime IT at Riverside Business Park on Natland Road in Kendal. Fenner Pearson is Meantime's managing director: "As an SME with both local and national clients, we are all too aware of the issues every business faces, " he says. "This is a rare opportunity to be able to discuss these issues directly with the people who can actually make a difference. We are delighted to be able to host such a prestigious event which will undoubtedly benefit the business community throughout Kendal and beyond. "

Tickets for the event, which starts at 3.30pm, are £50 per head and drinks and canapes will be provided. Click here to register or call Tim Farron's office on 01539 723403.

Meantime IT wins University of Cumbria web contract - Oct 2009

Meantime, which is based in Kendal, Cumbria, won the substantial contract following a two month bidding process involving three companies from around the UK.

The website, which will be known as In Reach, is part of Cumbria Higher Learning's lifelong learning network, which has brought together each of the major higher education providers throughout Cumbria. In Reach will, for the first time, offer a single resource that will allow users to search on all the available courses throughout Cumbria.

Stephen Wheeler is the learning technology manager at University of Cumbria, which, along with Kendal College, Furness College, Carlisle College and Lakes College, is a lead partner in the delivery of the Lifelong Learning Network.Other partners include the University of Central Lancashire, Lancaster University, Open University and careers advice agencies such as Connexions and Aim Higher.

"In Reach is part of a wider Cumbria Higher Learning initiative which will provide a wide-ranging support programme to help people into higher education. We were asked to create an information site which would support the whole initiative by creating a single resource to provide all the information people need to know about courses, and also act as a system for the colleges and HE providers in Cumbria to check course availability."

"The scope of the project is incredibly complicated, because it's a multi-use information site," Steve continues. "People can use it to search for courses, colleges can use it as a search engine within their own sites and careers agencies and employers can use it as a tool for their clients and employees."

The information on In Reach will be broken down further to help individuals search for relevant information according to their circumstances, as Steve explains."We're targeting four key groups: returners to education, particularly those looking for a change in career; employers who can recognise the benefits of putting their staff through further education; employees who want to enhance their career prospects; and those who have no formal education, or poor prospects. The home page will give the user the option of entering via the group that is most appropriate to them, and then it will guide them through the site in a way that's best suited to their purposes."

Fenner Pearson is Meantime's managing director. "This is the type of project we relish at Meantime," he says. "We get a huge amount of satisfaction from taking complex requirements and providing a solution that is easy to use, both for administration and for the end user. We try to make it look easy! It's also a real pleasure to work with a client who has a strong grasp of their requirements and who have really engaged with us in developing a solution."

According to Stephen Wheeler, Meantime's attention to detail and thorough research was the deciding factor in awarding the contract. "We invited several companies to bid for the project, and Meantime was by far the best, " he says. "Fenner and his team really understood what we were saying, knew exactly what we wanted and had really done their homework on who we are, what we wanted and the technology we wanted to use.

"And although this contract is limited to 12 months, I have no doubt that we will maintain our relationship beyond the life of the project."

Meantime IT bucks redundancies trend and announces 33% growth - Aug 2009

A Kendal IT company which provides bespoke software for local authorities, social networking sites and tour operators has announced a 33% increase in turnover in the last 12 months.

Meantime, based in Kendal, Cumbria, has also just created its eighth full-time technical staff role, in a year which has seen IT job vacancies down 57%* and more than 335,000 redundancies in the sector in the last 12 months.

Meantime was founded in 2004 by managing director Fenner Pearson and has seen an overall increase in turnover of almost 300% in the last five years. After starting with just one employee, the company has just created a graduate position in web-development, taking the number of full-time technical staff to eight plus one part-time administration role.

Fenner, whose clients have included Royal Bank of Scotland, Asda and BT, puts the company's success down to his commitment to delivering IT systems on time and to budget.

"I've worked in IT since 1991 and I became very frustrated with the low standards that people have come to expect from their systems and providers," he says. "It seems to be accepted that jobs will take longer than they're supposed to, budgets will be exceeded and the finished result will never quite deliver what it promised. There's absolutely no need for any of that, and when I formed Meantime I made a clear commitment to deliver software on time, on budget and to the exact specification of the client."
That commitment has ensured Meantime's success, and over the last five years the company has grown solely through word of mouth, with half of its turnover coming from repeat business from existing customers and the rest from personal recommendation.

"Our clients know that they can trust us to deliver what they want without bombarding them with jargon and leaving them to muddle through when their system doesn't do what it was supposed to," says Fenner. "And for that reason, they return to us as they grow, and recommend us to other businesses."

Meantime's success has been recognised by the NWDA (North West Development Agency), which selected the company to take part in its High Growth Programme, a scheme created to support new businesses that have the scope to grow to a turnover of £0.5m within three years or established SMEs that have the ambition and capability of achieving a minimum of 20% per annum growth.

* IT Job Board, 4 August 2009

Meantime appoints Juliet Shaw Communications - Jul 2009

Meantime has appointed Juliet Shaw Communications to take care of its marketing and communications strategy and delivery.

Meantime has enjoyed a huge amount of growth over the last five years, with a 33% increase in turnover in the last year alone. Yet despite its success, the company has grown solely through word of mouth.

"The majority of our business comes from existing clients and personal recommendation," says managing director Fenner Pearson. "But we are now at the stage where we felt it was important to create a strong company image that would be instantly recognisable to both our existing clients and potential new ones. We are also incredibly proud of our success and the high standard of service we provide to our clients, and we are very keen to spread that message."

Juliet Shaw, who is based in Manchester and has clients in the private and public sector, agrees. "Fenner and his team have been so busy delivering a top quality service to their clients, they haven't stopped to consider that the work they are doing is very newsworthy. Yet that is very much the case, and it's my aim to create and deliver a marketing and communications strategy that will highlight the benefits of Meantime's services to those who would benefit from them.

"And as far as the company image is concerned, Meantime has developed a reputation for excellence simply by delivering exactly what they promise, on time and to budget, and it will be a pleasure to work with the team to build on that reputation."

Meantime's MD launches outspoken blog - Jun 2009

The passion with which Meantime managing director Fenner Pearson approaches his work is fully evident in the blog he has created, which can be found at http://systemsthatwork.blogspot.com, or by clicking on Fenner's personal profile on the Meantime website.

Having worked in the IT industry for more than 20 years, Fenner has always been outspoken in his criticism – and praise, where it's due – of standards within the IT industry. The blog will give Fenner an outlet for his personal opinions of all that's good and bad in the world of IT, and will cover topics including testing, data security and search engine optimisation, as well as featuring case studies from Fenner's own projects.

Meantime creates new graduate position - May 2009

Meantime has appointed computer science graduate Siqi Li as a web developer in a newly created graduate position. The creation of the new role sees the number of full-time technical staff at Meantime rise to eight, plus one part-time operations and finance manager.

Li, 24, who is originally from China but currently lives in Manchester, joins Meantime from Manchester University where he gained an MSc in Informatics. Prior to his post-graduate course, Li successfully achieved a degree in computer science from the University of East Anglia in Norwich.

His role at Meantime will involve developing web-based software for a wide range of projects, from developing content management systems to building e-commerce websites. Li says of his new position: "Meantime's ethos is to make sure we never miss a deadline, and that sits very well with the way I've always worked. For me personally I couldn't have asked for a better position after my MSc; I'm working with hugely experienced people on interesting and exciting projects in a company whose culture reflects my own commitment to IT."

Meantime's MD Fenner Pearson commented on Li's appointment: "We take great care in selecting people to join our team here at Meantime because our company culture is very important to us, and we need to ensure that anyone who joins us will enhance our way of working. Li does just that – he has a fantastic academic background in IT, is extremely hardworking and keen to learn how to apply his theory to a practical environment. We're very pleased to have him on board."