“This exercise required us to compile financial data for the project team, so it needs a certain level of skill set and understanding of accounting principles before the exercise can be carried out. Our existing vendors were unable to support us, so we ventured out to establish new working relationships,” explains Mr Yun Chee Keen, the Group Chief Financial Officer of RHT Group of Companies.

This was where Advenz came in. Through the introduction of trusted auditors, Chee Keen connected with Jaslin Lau (Managing Partner of Advenz), and quickly established a collaborative working relationship.

Work Ethic, Innovation and Speed

“Besides sharing similar work ethics and values, the Advenz team is also able to offer innovative solutions to clients,” says Chee Keen. Ad-hoc corporate projects typically come with short deadlines, but Advenz exceeded expectations by coming up with creative solutions to meet the project’s fast-paced demands.

“To save time, Jaslin took the initiative to build a model very quickly despite having limited knowledge and experience with RHT,” says Chee Keen. This automated model efficiently managed alterations across multiple complex Excel spreadsheets, streamlining the process for a large-scale project. As a result, the Advenz team delivered accurate and proficient results within a shorter timeframe.

Scaling up the Hybrid Model

After the completion of the initial engagement, Chee Keen made the strategic decision to expand the partnership with Advenz by engaging them for monthly bookkeeping services for some entities in the RHT Group of Companies.

Recognising the potential efficiency gains, he explains, “We started to explore this hybrid model [mix of in-house and outsourced bookkeeping professionals] recently, and we foresee it will make the team more efficient.”

Managing over 30 entities has always posed a challenge for the finance team. Each entity differs – in terms of activity level, reporting requirements, among other factors.

As a general practice, Chee Keen typically outsources bookkeeping for smaller and dormant entities to their pool of external vendors – since the work will be less time sensitive or have longer timelines. This frees up the in-house accounting staff to focus on more value-added work, such as overseeing entities that are actively operating, subject to additional regulatory reporting requirements, or structured in manners that necessitate customised consolidation processes.

Chee Keen emphasises, “What makes the Advenz team different is the quality of people. They are of higher caliber with the ability to support clients in coming up with holistic solutions.”