Treatwell Improves Month-End Close Transparency and Team Collaboration with FloQast

Salon management software maker Treatwell has been digitally revolutionising the hair and beauty community across Europe, but until recently its month-end Close tasks and tie-outs were stuck in the digital dark ages of shared spreadsheets and manual reconciliations. Since implementing FloQast Close, Treatwell’s accounting team – now spread across 13 countries – has improved transparency, trust, and turnaround times for a more confident and collaborative Close experience.

As the leading booking platform in Europe for arranging hair and beauty appointments, London-based Treatwell has created a user-friendly and powerful way for salons and their clients to connect.

Since 2008, Treatwell has successfully attracted 40,000 salon partners across 13 countries that process over 5 million bookings every month. The growth has brought many advantages; however, it also presented some specific challenges on the accounting side when it comes to the month-end Close.

As Group Financial Controlling Manager, Jack Robson leads the monthly Close for Treatwell. A process that, before the FloQast implementation, left much to be desired. 

“Reconciliations weren’t always tracked in the best way,” Jack said. “And management wasn’t clear where we were with the Close, which created stress and confusion across the team.”

Nazia Begum, Group Financial Reporting Accountant, adds more detail on the friction spots of the Close before FloQast.

“Before FloQast we managed our Close process on Google Sheets, it was a very manual process where members of the team had to go in and highlight cells depending on status,” Nazia said. “We needed a process for preparing the workbooks and ensuring that review notes would be addressed in a timely manner.”

Organising and Automating a Better Month-End Close

Jack and his team selected FloQast for its modern user experience and deeper functionality, as compared to other competitors in the space. Automatic trial balance updates, real-time checklist notifications, and convenient note-making capabilities keep teams up-to-date, and management informed.

“FloQast Close works really well with NetSuite, especially on the reconciliation side of things, having that automated pull-in of balances saves a lot of time and manual work,” Jack said. “This means that reviewers have confidence that the balance is, in fact, the latest balance per NetSuite, and it also alerts the reviewers as soon as anything goes out of balance, which is really handy.”

Begum said the implementation process was fast and efficient, and easier than expected thanks to the expert support team.

“Implementing FloQast with our ERP system, NetSuite, was really smooth,” Nazia said. “The Support team was very knowledgeable, since most of them were trained as accountants and auditors, and they knew what we were talking about right away and how to answer.”

Given the team’s international remote locations, Jack said FloQast’s checklist feature has been a welcome addition as well.

“The checklist feature has been great,” Jack said. “Because we are such an international team, it means that people are always aware of what everyone else on the team is doing, which means that we can work through tasks quickly, know where we stand, and keep things moving.”

Top of the Line Customer Support – and Implementation Success

Jack shared that he appreciates the relationship their team has built with the FloQast Customer Success team.

“The FloQast team has been brilliant,” he said. “It’s nice that a lot of the team are ex-auditors themselves. Our finance team has a lot of ex-auditors as well, so we have a lot of common knowledge. The implementation has been extremely smooth. It’s easy to understand the product, and even though we’ve got a large team, they’re always on hand to answer any questions.” – Nazia Begum, Group Financial Reporting Accountant, Treatwell

Jack added that the NetSuite integration was faster than expected for an enterprise solution like FloQast. The FloQast ‘Built for NetSuite’ certified API integration got the Treatwell team up and running quickly, enabling faster adoption and shorter time-to-value.

“Implementation was easy and straightforward, end-to-end, it took two weeks,” Jack said. “The FloQast API for NetSuite connected instantly, as did the integrations with Slack and Google Drive.”

FloQast Is ‘Fantastic And Making Our Lives Easier’

Uncertainties, unknowns, and delayed tasks have been reduced for the Treatwell team since FloQast went live.

“We’re no longer in the dark about where we are in the process or trying to track down updates and details,” Jack said. “FloQast automatically pulls in the latest balances from NetSuite, and the whole process feels more relaxed and reliable.” 

When asked if he would recommend FloQast to other accounting teams, Jack was emphatic that his team’s overall experience has been great.

“FloQast has been easier to implement than we thought it would be,” Robson said. “The team is fantastic, and they make everything run smoothly. The software has made our lives a lot easier. The time savings we have across the team, across all the different countries, has paid dividends as well.”

Jack said it’s made the finance leaders happy as well.

“Our leadership wanted faster and better insights into our Close so they could make better decisions,” Jack said. “And we’ve delivered on that promise.” – Nazia Begum, Group Financial Reporting Accountant, Treatwell