Contents
) Terms of reference
2) Procedure
3) Introduction
4) Aims, objectives and goals of St Georges
5) St George's core business
6) Purpose for which ICT is used
7) Checking Stock and re-stocking
8) Diagnostic Software
9) Customer Information
0) Customer appointment booking
1) Customer purchases and transactions
2) Accounting Software
3) Advertising
4) ICT in sales
5) ICT in purchase
6) ICT in finance
7) Conclusion
) Terms of reference
This report has been written by Jack Michaels by the request of Mr John Gaulding. This report will show how ICT impacts on and help St Georges run and maintain a high quality business.
2) Procedure
The report will show why and how the many internal departments of St Georges use ICT to successfully run the business. The information I have used has come from John Gaulding and Julie Clements, the internet and leaflets supplied by St Georges
3) Introduction
This report will focus and show how St Georges use ICT as a hole and how the separate departments use it and what would be done without ICT. St Georges is an established vet with a long history. St Georges was first established by Major Frank Chambers in around 1920, and, as common with older veterinary clinics, the site where St Georges is located was originally a blacksmiths. Because in those days pets were rare, most of the work was carried out wit horses and farm animals, and as machinery took the place of the work horses did, most of the work was carried out with farm animals. After world war Mr Chambers was joined by his son, Douglas Franklin and TAM. Over the years the practice continued its growth. They obviously used a manual system before the advances in technology that we have now, which would have been very tedious. Douglas' son David also joined the practice. There were a lot of farms and smallholdings around the area so David's interest in horses led to an increase in this branch of the practice. It was not until around the late 1970's/early 1980's that small animals were a large part of the clinics work and service, as this was when household pets became more common. Helen, David's wife, also joined the St Georges team. The growth of the clinic continued new buildings were developed to support the high demands. They converted part of a house into new areas for the clinic, a house in Albrighton was converted into a surgery and an equine clinic with operating theatre was built in Pattingham
Like in the 1980's, small animal work saw a large increase in the 1990's, small animal work being the largest part of the clinic! The name of the clinic was also changed to St Georges. John Gaulding and Andrew joined David and Helen as partners in 1994. The development of the Wolverhampton site, converting the other half of the house, was completed in 1996. Because of the lack in farms left in the area there was little work with farm animals or horses and their equine work now involved mainly pleasure horses. In 1999 they began to have an out of hour's service. This manned by a team of vets, nurses and receptionists who now themselves seem to nocturnal
In the new millennium David and Helen retired from the practice and a new surgery was opened in Sedgley. There are now 15 surgeons a nursing team of 20 and admin team of 12. They are the very first Veterinary practice to be inspected both by BSAVA and BVHA at the Wolverhampton branch, and were awarded the investors in people award in 2004. There was also a new logo designed in 2002, the 'St Georges Dragon'.
4) Aims and objectives of St Georges
To supple a high quality of service, giving the animal's good care and ...
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In the new millennium David and Helen retired from the practice and a new surgery was opened in Sedgley. There are now 15 surgeons a nursing team of 20 and admin team of 12. They are the very first Veterinary practice to be inspected both by BSAVA and BVHA at the Wolverhampton branch, and were awarded the investors in people award in 2004. There was also a new logo designed in 2002, the 'St Georges Dragon'.
4) Aims and objectives of St Georges
To supple a high quality of service, giving the animal's good care and having good customer support, and to insure the business as a hole is to a high quality. They need to make sure they haves the right employees that are fully fit and able to fore fill their specific job criteria. They most also have good technology, that is being constantly being updated to keep up with technology, and the competitive market.
5) Core Business
All of the St Georges clinics contain the only veterinary hospital in the Midlands. Containing full medical, surgical, anaesthetic and hospital facilities that have a 24 hour emergency service. The hospital also has separate wards for dogs, cats and rabbits as well as caring for various pets and animals. These facilities is what give St Georges an advantage over the rest of the market and its competitors
6) Purpose for Which ICT is used
* Telephones and mobile phones to contact customers, suppliers and on call vets
* Laptops loaded with appropriate software for on call doctors
* Main computers on site for storage of animal, customer and supplier information
* Chip and Pin for customers to pay for goods and services
* Fridges to store certain medicine
* Internet to order supplies online, and make payments via paypal
* Email to contact customers and suppliers
* PDA to check stoke levels, and automatically update main computer
* SAGE software for day to day running of business
* Microsoft Word for creating letters and invoices, Excel for creating company spreadsheets and invoices, Publisher for creating leaflets and newsletter and powerpoint for creating presentation
7) Receiving and checking Stock
When the vet or nurse uses products, they update this on their laptop, computer or PDA, which will then alert the computer in the purchasing department, that firstly stocks are low and will need to be ordered and when they are completed depleted (which rarely happens as orders are made when the product is in low quantity) The alert for low quantity of products, will depend on what the product is, as some products need to be in a higher quantity to others and may be used in a higher frequency.
When orders are received, they are updated on the system to show that there is a sufficient quantity of this product
8) Diagnostic Software
St Georges use a computer program called bespoke. Bespoke it tailor made to give diagnostics of animals, can also be used by vets on call on their laptop, which proves a vital program, especially in emergencies where an on call vet could not check diagnostics at the head quarters and make detailed diagnostics themselves. It also allows the vet to see what medicines to prescribe to certain animals with certain conditions, and what amount of the medicine to prescribe
9) Customer Information
Customer information is stored on databases and spreadsheets created on Microsoft Access and excel by the admin staff. They can then be easily and quickly accessed by staff when need be, and will include information such as customer name, contact details, pet, pet conditions, services used, products bought and any additional information that be needed by the admin staff, nurses or vets
0) Customer appointment bookings
A customer can book an appointment over the phone, in person or over the internet. Once they have stated the date, time and meaning of appointment, the information will be entered onto the main computer, where it will be stored an also sent to the concerning vet or nurses PDA, laptop or mobile phone, so they are always aware of their upcoming appointments without having to check at the office
1) Customer purchases and transactions
Customers can buy goods from the branches or off the internet, and obviously need to pay for the services St Georges have provided. When buying off the internet, the products can be paid for in three separate ways, via paypal, credit card over fax or phone, or cheque. Paypal is the most used and well known internet transaction service. It is totally secure and has a user protection guarantee that protects customers being victim to fraud and loosing money. Using such a well known company works to St George's advantage as it makes people feel secure to use such a well known and efficient company to transfer their money.
When paying for the services that St Georges have supplied, there are also a number of ways of paying. Immediate payment via cash or chip and pin, or, for generally more expensive services, the sale will be agreed, followed by an invoice with a loan agreement or fixed payments over a certain amount of time. This is in case people cannot afford the services straight away, as some veterinary surgery can be expensive, they can pay the money back over a set amount of time
2) Accounting Software
Like any business, for St Georges to keep providing the services they do, they need to make money and make a profit. They need to make sure they stick to budgets and not over spend, making sure there is enough money going into each area of the business and enough money to pay wages.
To make sure they do this they have to be very efficient with keeping track of financial data. To do this St Georges use a piece of accounting software called SAGE. SAGE keeps track of the company's financial state, analysing the outgoing and incoming funds, making it easy and manageable for St Georges to make sure they are keeping to budgets and projected targets.
3) Advertising
A main part of St Georges remaining successful and profitable is to keep customers coming back and to keep gaining new customers. To do this St Georges must advertise their services and goods to potential customers, and keep current customers informed off current offers.
To do this St Georges use advertising, this falls under the marketing department. They distribute newsletters and flyers to local shops, and send them to customers on the database, they also place adverts in local newspapers. This is a crucial part of keeping the business at a steady growth.
Functions of ICT at St Georges
4) ICT in sales
* Creating invoices to make customers aware of fees - Made by using Spreadsheets, databases, word and mail merge
* Making sure all sales have ran smoothly by checking funds have been transferred - Done by checking paypal and using internet banking to make sure funds have been added
5) ICT in purchasing
* Ordering products so that the nurses and vets have the sufficient supplies to work to a high standard - Bought either over the phone or over the internet depending on the supplier and products
* Finding the best prices to save the company money - Searching the internet for best prices and phoning many suppliers to find the cheapest
6) ICT in finance
* Keeping track of incoming and outgoing funds, budgets and profits - Done by looking over past records on spreadsheet, database, word and SAGE, and also keeping track of SAGE, which analyses financial data to make sure St Georges is sticking to budgets and projected targets
* Setting down budgets. This is extremely important to make sure that St Georges make a profit, if the money for budgets in inappropriate it could result in St Georges at a deficit - This is done by looking over past records on spreadsheet, database and SAGE and past budgets, and also accounting for growth, then formulating a budget for the forthcoming year, with the aide of SAGE
7) Conclusion
ICT is crucial to St Georges in several ways. Firstly there is the veterinary side, the technology that keeps St Georges ahead of the competition, makes them able to treat the animals to a higher standard and also gain customers, which every business needs. There is also the admin side. Without ICT in all the departments at St Georges (or any business) they would operate far less efficiently. Customer's details would not be able to store anywhere as easily, information would not be able to be sent out easily, appointments wouldn't be as easily made, financial records would be extremely hard to analyse and made budgets from, and the list goes on and on. It also help to keep costs down, as the efficiency means there does not need to be as many staff, to sort through the much more tedious data, where in addition human errors would be made costing St Georges time and money, however without the devoted individuals at St Georges it wouldn't be able to function. Without ICT every aspect of St George's operation would be far different, far harder and far less efficient, showing us how important ICT is. It also showed us how even more efficient ICT can be when used in specific ways e.g. automatic stock checking and alerting when quantities are low. This is extremely efficient, we know the stock numbers of exact products, the products that need to be ordered and the quantities, without anyone having to specifically find this information out. In all ICT impacts every aspect of St Georges or any business, and makes them far more efficient and smooth lined.
Jack Michaels
