Pinnacle Award Finalist
Congratulations to the AFP 2023 Pinnacle Award Finalists, Casey's General Store, Delta Airlines and Ultradent Products, Inc. All three finalists were chosen because they found ways to overcome their companies' unique challenges. Now it is your turn to help determine who will be the AFP 2023 Pinnacle Award Grand Prize Winner.
Let us know which of the three finalists you think should win by casting your vote. Votes must be submitted by September 22.
From an improved antiquated branch banking model to modernized budget creation, learn more about each finalist:
Casey's General Store
Casey's General Store improved its antiquated branch banking model, which was consuming valuable resources and having a profound impact on both store operations and the Store Support Center. Casey’s implemented a smart safe program in all of its 2,550 stores. The fully scalable bank-agnostic solution uses just one platform partner and enables a standard, consistent process. As a result of this solution, Casey’s has seen store labor reduction of six hours per store per week, annual labor savings of approximately $10.4 million, and $2 million in annual bank fees saved.
What benefits will this solution have in the future?
With a scalable solution that is bank agnostic, the platform enables the opportunity to pursue future improvements and process optimization. In phase two, POS integration, Casey's will be able to reduce another 2 to 4 hours per week per store upon successful integration. This would translate to an additional approximate $4 to $8 million in labor savings per year, bringing the cumulative reduction in labor associated with store treasury tasks and related record keeping to 56% and 72%, respectively.
Delta Air Lines, Inc.
Improved the passenger reimbursement experience. Previously, Delta relied on check issuance, which was an inefficient, manual process. To improve this experience, Delta implemented a technology solution that gave customers access to their compensation in real-time without having to provide banking details to agents. The solution is integrated with the company’s case management system, providing improved visibility and tracking. More than 205,000 electronic payments have been issued to passengers under the new system, amounting to over $71 million.
What benefits will this solution have in the future?
Moving forward there will be even more opportunities for the Treasury team at Delta to enhance the reimbursement process, including expanding this solution to more international markets and offering additional forms of payments (not only same day ACH). This platform will allow Delta to continue to improve and refine how payments are handled, as part of the company’s constant push to deliver the best customer experience in the industry.
Ultradent Product, Inc.
Modernized its budget creation and reporting process, using existing tools, resources and people. Ultradent’s FP&A team consisted of only six people but maintained 75+ dashboards to feed 300+ analysts to C-level across 181 countries. Partnering with IT Business Intelligence and Data Architecture teams, they built a driver-based planning system that automates forecasting and reporting processes to all levels around the globe. They developed predictive budgeting, minimized manual transformations and data duplication, and are working on creating automated error notifications. As a result of the modernization, they empowered their business partners, delivered more monthly reporting information in four fewer days and can create a draft global forecast/budget in approximately 30 minutes.
What benefits will this solution have in the future?
Looking ahead Ultradent plans to continue the modernization plan. Up next they will include Write-Back features so internal customers can write-back timing changed to their budget and documentation of expenses as needed. Additionally, they are working to incorporate natural language automated executive reviews and Power BI data alerts using Microsoft Flow while also building an FP&A facts library, so internal customers have key attributes at their disposal for quick analysis of projects.