Modernising Financial Management at Homerton College with Sage Intacct for Education

About Homerton College

Homerton College is one of the 31 autonomous colleges of the University of Cambridge. With a 250-year history and a forward-looking mission, the College is committed to academic excellence, inclusivity, and supporting students from all backgrounds to thrive in a changing world.

As an independent institution within the University, Homerton College is responsible for managing its own finances and operates a complex financial structure which requires accurate reporting, clear oversight, and robust financial control.

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Previous System Challenges

Homerton College previously relied on legacy accounting systems such as Sage50 for their financial management needs. As Homerton’s financial and reporting requirements evolved, their existing finance system increasingly struggled to keep pace. While some processes worked well, the overall solution relied heavily on manual workarounds and bolt-ons, limiting visibility and efficiency.

Key challenges included:

• Limited and inflexible reporting, particularly for audit and year-end requirements

• Heavy reliance on spreadsheets, increasing manual effort and risk

• Inefficient consolidation across multiple legal entities

• Time-consuming finance processes, especially at period and year-end

• Senior finance staff spending too much time managing the system, rather than focusing on strategic financial planning

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Objectives

Homerton College set out to implement a modern financial management solution that could simplify complexity and support the College both now and in the future. Their objectives included:

• A true cloud-based finance system capable of supporting multiple legal entities

• Clear, intuitive reporting and dashboards to reduce reliance on Excel

• Streamlined sales and purchase processes, including student fee and accommodation billing

• Improved efficiency and control across departments

• A strong return on investment through time savings and improved financial insight

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The Solution: Sage Intacct for Education

After reviewing the market, Homerton College selected Sage Intacct for Education, implemented by ION, as a modern, true-cloud financial management platform capable of supporting the College’s complexity without unnecessary bolt-ons.

ION worked closely with the Homerton finance team to configure Sage Intacct for Education around their specific structure and reporting requirements. This included:

• Multi-entity configuration and consolidation, enabling the College to manage the main College, two subsidiary companies, and a shared LLP within a single system, while producing consolidated or standalone trial balances as required

• A streamlined chart of accounts and dimensional structure, improving consistency, reducing manual journals, and significantly enhancing reporting accuracy

• Advanced reporting and dashboards, giving the finance team faster access to audit-ready real-time data, management accounts, and departmental insights without reliance on Excel

• Sales ledger optimisation, supporting high-volume student fee and accommodation billing through bulk invoice creation, replication of previous invoices, and efficient data imports

• Improved purchase-to-pay workflows, enabling budget checking, approvals, and invoice matching to be managed more effectively within the finance system

As a result, Sage Intacct for Education is reducing manual intervention, improving data integrity, and delivering the visibility the finance team needs to operate with confidence. The impact has been particularly clear around reporting and period-end processes, where the College is reclaiming significant time previously lost to manual corrections and data extraction.  

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What Homerton said...

College accountant, Jim Morris, said:

“The limitations of our previous system meant we were spending far too much time extracting and correcting data, particularly around reporting and audit. Sage Intacct for Education gives us the clarity and confidence we need and frees up valuable time for us to focus on running and developing the college financially.”

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With Sage Intacct for Education in place, Homerton College now has a scalable, futureproof financial platform that can evolve alongside the organisation.

More information on Sage Intacct for Education.