MIS Systems in Birmingham

[dhm83]

I don't know what everyone else thinks but, over the last year I have worked in the Birmingham area I have found it very difficult to bring in new suppliers that have not worked with BCC before. The best example of this I have is with MIS provision. My school currently use the Facility CMIS & e-Portal system from Advanced Learning. After 10 years of Capita SIMS.net experience else where I found CMIS a bit of a culture shock. I have done my best to work with CMIS and get to know how it works, but a year on I am still struggling to show any appreciation for it. I have already looked at a SIMS.net conversion but with this option costing over £10,000 this is simply a no go. So I looked at other offerings such as RM Integris, Broadcom and others. After a few months of discussions we found a workable solution with RM to try RM Integris, however getting a conversion was not so easy. With BCC putting up a lot of resistance especially with a conversion to RM Finance. After much time we ended up having to revert back and continue our CMIS subscription. I am now reviewing our situation again for next April and I am looking to see if I can get a conversion this time. RM have offered a demo to any schools that are dissatisfied with CMIS, SIMS, or any other to see if we can force a change and open up the suppliers lists so that as schools we can get a better deal for ourselves and use a system that us as professionals can do our jobs with. If anyone else in the Birmingham area would like to join in and have a joint demo with us, get in touch and let me know and I can get the ball rolling. Rant over. :-)

[jamin100]

Have you thought about moving to Progresso as this will eventually take over from CMIS anyway

[ChristineAndrews]

If you are really still not happy then don't just struggle with CMIS try contacting the other MIS Suppliers again, maybe something has changed, cost, products etc. Can you contact other schools in Birmingham that have changed from CMIS and see how they are getting on. Whatever you do good luck.

[foofighterjim]

We recently moved to SIMS with support from SIPS (formerly SMIS). Used them at a previous school and can't fault them.

[dhm83]

I used SMIS (now SIPS) for 10 years in my last job in the Sandwell authority and I agree you cannot fault them. I would love to be able to convert to SIMS but the conversion costs are simply too much for a small primary like us to swallow. I really don't fancy looking in the direction of Progresso as this is simply CMIS on the fly, and CMIS really isn't that reliable. I have looked at an offering from RM to go cloud based, but Birmingham will not support any sort of conversion, and are making the idea of a finance conversion very tricky.

[Alis_Klar]

You don't have to use the same MIS and finance package. We were...

CMIS + CMIS Finance then

SIMS + FMS then

-Academy conversion-

SIMS + CMIS then

now ScholarPack and PSFinancials

 

Unfortunately we still have to keep CMIS to access previous financial years data.

I wouldn't reccommend PSFinancials as they are more focused on coporate needs than education.

[Trapper]

Far too much money to move to SIMS from CMIS and it really is irritating. Link2ICT seem to lump the conversion costs on to stop schools from moving.

 

I can't understand why Birmingham schools went from SIMs in the 1990s to Facility. Some stuck with SIMs and they really are reaping the benefits now. Facility just doesn't cut it. We've lost highly skilled office staff because they just find Facility far too frustrating!