When Edwine Alphonse joined Ramp as the company’s first-ever financial controller and internal accountant in 2021, she had her work cut out for her.
Ramp, a top-rated finance automation platform that provides corporate cards, expense management, bill payment, accounting automation, and other financial integrations, had been operating as a single entity on its previous accounting provider but was now experiencing tremendous growth. In fact, the NetSuite SuiteCloud Developer Network (SDN) partner was recently named the No. 1 most innovative company in North America by Fast Company and the No. 1 fastest growing company under 2,000 employees in Okta’s 2023 Businesses at Work Report. Ramp (opens in new tab)has also significantly expanded its product line over the past year, including upgrades to its SuiteApp integration with NetSuite.
“My first goal was to clean up the books,” said Alphonse, whose next charge was managing the company’s first audit. “Right after that audit I realized that if we wanted to grow and scale, we would need an enterprise resource planning platform with enhanced controls.”
For example, Ramp’s previous solution couldn’t handle journal entry approvals or consolidations. The company needed additional functionality to keep pace with its expanding needs.
As its customer base grew and Ramp expanded its product portfolio, for example, the company added customer receivables financing to its list of offerings. It was also in hiring mode, having grown from 70 associates to 425 within a year’s time.
“We went from one entity to two overnight after creating a special-purpose entity to support the financing of customer receivables,” Alphonse said.
The company has since added four more entities, all of which had to be consolidated for financial management.
“Consolidation was extremely challenging with our previous solution,” she said. “We had to create separate manual Excel files. If there was one change, we had to go back and change the whole Excel sheet.”
Clear Winner
With a significant number of Ramp’s customer base already using NetSuite, the cloud ERP platform was a top contender during the company’s four-month-long evaluation process. Ramp chose NetSuite both for its capabilities and the fact that many of its customers were already on the platform.
“In the end, NetSuite was the clear winner for us because it had all the functionality that we needed,” said Alphonse. “The ERP offered good controls for our auditing processes and also integrated with our existing software applications.”
For example, NetSuite integrated directly with the company’s Okta SSO (single sign-on),Software Security Assurance (SSA), and even Ramp’s internal use of their own product. Alphonse said Ramp picked NetSuite due to its reliability, scalability, multi-entity support, integrations, and strong reporting capabilities.
“We felt confident that NetSuite could scale with our business and support our continued growth,” she explained. “Many vendors, software, and systems integrate with NetSuite, which also meets our needs for stronger purchasing controls, tax processes, and compliance.”
Working with NetSuite Alliance Partner Myers-Holum, Inc., Ramp implemented NetSuite and connected its new ERP to its existing software applications.
All-In-One System
With NetSuite as its ERP, Ramp has reduced the time it takes to close its books by about 30%, to between eight and 10 days. Alphonse wants to reduce that number to about five days — a goal she knows NetSuite will help her achieve, especially because Ramp uses its own product internally and has also integrated its full Ramp-powered spend management workflows with NetSuite. Now, every credit card transaction, reimbursement, and bill payment that’s processed on Ramp seamlessly syncs into NetSuite.
Ramp’s accounting team also spends less time on consolidation, which in the past required them to create reports both for management and for external stakeholders.
“We’ve customized the type of reports we need right in NetSuite and can now consolidate quickly,” says Alphonse. “We now have more time to work on process improvements and implementing controls.”
This additional time has allowed Ramp to consider new NetSuite integrations that will optimize processes even more.
“Our goal for the coming year is to see what types of integrations we can add to make NetSuite even more efficient for us,” said Alphonse, who also anticipates a time when Ramp’s accounting team can use NetSuite for daily closing. “Ramp’s integration with NetSuite is an example of how well integrations can work, and we want to replicate that with other systems we use.”
To other financial controllers that are struggling under the weight of basic accounting systems and spreadsheets, Alphonse has a simple piece of advice: Don’t wait.
“With Ramp and NetSuite, you can implement controls, establish roles, and create a sense of accountability for your team. That can only upscale the financial close process.”
Looking to leverage the powerful automation and integration between NetSuite and Ramp? Learn more.(opens in new tab)