Customer Stories – Taishin D.A. Finance

Today’s business environment is rapidly changing, and with it, so have consumers’ attitude and behaviors towards investment and finance. Generating maximum returns through investments using limited assets has become the priority on many people’s minds. Taishin D.A. Finance Co., Ltd., (TSDA) a wholly-owned company of Taishin International Bank established in October 1997, has long dedicated itself to providing financing services related to new cars, used cars, motorcycles and other vehicles. Basing its business philosophy on “integrity, commitment, innovation and cooperation”, the company enables people to secure necessary funds in the shortest possible time.

Although there is a fairly competitive vehicle financing market in Taiwan, TSDA’s greatest advantage lies with providing customized services for individual customers through a professional team. Taken together with their proven integrity and commitment, TSDA is believed to be one the best and most trustworthy financing service companies in the market. Looking back to September 2013, however, when it resumed operations, the company’s understaffed IT Department not only had to build a core system from scratch to fulfil the company’s operational needs, but also had to assist the Finance Department in finding a financial management system with comprehensive functions. After evaluating the group’s structure, the company’s operations and technical support requirements, it finally chose the Financial Information ON-Line (FION) solution, a financial management and reporting system introduced by FlexSystem.

Hung Biying, Associate General Manager of the IT Department of TSDA, said, “There were a number of financial and accounting software suites on the market, but those products designed for large companies were overly expensive and included many functions the Finance Department did not need, making it a waste if we purchased these products. Comparatively, FlexSystem’s financial management solution was reasonably priced and could fulfil 99% of TSDA’s demands, and only very few customized functions were needed. As many subsidiaries under Taishin Group also used the same financial management software, its stability and functions were recognized by the IT departments of the group, and there were no worries about data transfers between different systems. This made FlexSystem’s solution our first choice.”

Due to the growing popularity of public cloud services at the time, when TSDA first introduced FlexSystem’s financial management solution, it chose a cloud service monthly rental plan for this product. This reduced early stage investment costs as it was not necessary to purchase a physical server and perform follow-up maintenance on the financial management software, which enabled the IT Department to focus on developing and maintaining the core IT system. Secondly, the cost on purchasing a financial system is considered a fixed asset, which necessitates the amortization of fixed assets per year. The rental fee for a cloud service, on the other hand, is considered a variable cost, which can be recorded as a monthly cost. This is both easier to budget when preparing financial statements and can better reflect the real costs of usage.

The FION system can prepare financial statements quickly as it features a simple and easy-to-use interface while providing comprehensive functions. This made it easy for TSDA’s Finance Department to familiarize itself with the product, even without the help of the IT Department. They can prepare different kinds of designated statements quickly based on their work requirements—exactly what was needed by the Financial Department and IT Department.

Hung pointed out that with traditional software, if the Financial Department wanted to acquire the latest version to obtain new functions or modifications as required by law, this entailed signing up for a maintenance contract with the provider, which could result in huge long term costs. Comparatively, deploying a cloud service negates the need for client-side software updates as FlexSystem ensures the version used online is always the latest. With the FION system’s wide-ranging functions, the IT Department was able to reduce its workload in preparing statements, which significantly improved the company’s overall efficiency.

It’s worth noting that FlexSystem provides excellent technical support. Other than providing TSDA with customized services, they also helped connect the financial and accounting services to other applications, which made data transfers more accurate and efficient. This enabled the Financial Department and IT Department to address various issues it could not before.

In an effort to reduce paper consumption and make data transfers more transparent and convenient, Taiwan’s Ministry of Finance has promoted the use of electronic invoicing, a practice adopted by an increasing number of industries. To help it adopt this initiative, TDSA is currently working with FlexSystem to enable electronic invoicing. By doing so, it hopes to further strengthen the company’s competitiveness within the vehicle financing market, and gradually reach its goal of leading the sector.