NHS Trust Deploys New Software to Manage Property Leases

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17 April 2023

The Princess Alexandra Hospital NHS Trust has deployed a new online solution to improve its day-to-day management and control of its asset base, in line with IFRS 16 lease accounting requirements.

IFRS 16 is a new global standard that came into force for NHS organisations in April 2022 after being phased across the private and public sectors. It means that procurement teams will have to change how they report leases.

To assist with managing the challenges and complexities around this new standard, The Princess Alexandra Hospital NHS Trust will use MRI's lease accounting solution to replace its spreadsheet-based process for managing and reporting on property and equipment leases.

The trust operates across The Princess Alexandra Hospital in Harlow, the Herts and Essex Hospital in Bishop’s Stortford, and St Margaret’s Hospital in Epping.

AI Lease Abstraction Tool

The Princess Alexandra Hospital NHS Trust will also use MRI’s artificial intelligence (AI) lease abstraction tool to extract its lease information from documents, validate the data and feed it directly into the lease accounting software.

Samuel Owusu-Ansah, Head of Financial Services at The Princess Alexandra Hospital NHS Trust, said: “Whilst we do not have a large portfolio of leases, we wanted to set in place an efficient and streamlined process and system from the outset to manage our data centrally and to automate calculations, notifications and disclosure reporting. Having complete confidence in the accuracy of our lease financials and ability to meet audit requirements not just for this year but to maintain compliance in the long term is key.

“It had become an onerous and time-consuming task to track our assets on a spreadsheet that offered only basic functionality. We required a more robust and automated solution and are excited to be able to manage depreciation calculations and run reports at a click of a button, which will accelerate our month- and year-end procedures considerably.

“MRI Software’s excellent track record in delivering proven lease and capital accounting software across the public sector made our choice simple, and we are now looking forward to working with the team over the coming weeks to get up and running to ensure full IFRS compliance.” 

Picture: a photograph of healthcare professional, shown from the neck down, with a stethoscope hanging around their neck. Image Credit: Pexels

Article written by Ella Tansley | Published 17 April 2023

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