Vantage Academy Trust is a mixed CE Multi-Academy Trust, which recognises and supports the individual ethos of non-faith schools, and is currently made up of six Church of England schools and four community schools. The Trust operates across a diverse geographical area in the North West, with hubs in Knowsley, Bolton and Manchester. Vantage adopted IMP Purchasing, alongside IMP Planner, in 2025.
“My role in the central finance team is to look at how we can support everyone in schools so they can deliver to the best of their ability,” commented Deputy CFO James Speechley, who joined Vantage in February 2025. “So far that has entailed the roll-out of IMP’s new purchasing system, which allows schools to have direct control over their ordering and enable the senior leaders to monitor their financial position in close to real time. We have also implemented a revised budgeting system which will enable more efficient reporting and forecasting.
“This aligns with the wider direction of travel at Vantage, improving our financial systems and putting schools and the frontline in charge of their budgets as much as possible. Alongside developments around our processes, we have been working with all our schools to make sure they fully understand what their budget is, what that means in practice, and what their flexibility is: what they have and haven’t got the choice to work with.”
Vantage began working with IMP on Purchasing, which enables trusts to systemise its entire requisition-to-invoice management process, and empowers budget holders to make smart spend decisions, around the time of James’ arrival.
“Where IMP were really helpful is we were able to explain how we thought it should work, how we want it to look, and then they were able to take that and give us the system we need,” James said. “It wasn’t the other way round, where IMP came to us with a system we needed to fit to. What was developed was informed by how headteachers who are responsible for the budgets have said they want it to work, and how the flow-through approval should be set up. IMP have been flexible enough to make that happen, which is exactly what you want.”
Initially, Purchasing went live via a ‘soft’ launch in May/June alongside the Trust’s former system to support the transition within schools before the end of the 2024-25 academic year, and this was supported by a series of training sessions. “Now, Purchasing is the sole system we have and we are exporting from that into our financial ledger, which is a different software package,” James explained. “We had a very complex system with lots of different codes and lots of different sub-codes, and have stripped that down to as few as possible. IMP have been very helpful in our approach to that, and even when we have made changes that in hindsight haven’t quite worked, they have been able to accommodate going back to where we had been and still have the flow through the system.”
James outlined a number of benefits for school and trust leaders through Purchasing. “Previously, schools would get a month-end financial report and that was the first time they saw their finances,” he said. “They would have some offline approvals via an Excel spreadsheet, but there was no way of keeping track unless they actively built their own financial ledger, which is clearly not going to happen. Now headteachers can log into the system and see what is on their budget, so it allows us as a trust to get in front of the right people that are making decisions on spend. They are literally able to look at the information in front of them, understand their current position, and decide which way they want to go. The visibility and accuracy through IMP is so much better.”
With “multiple different purchases order types for different types of schools”, and a challenging financial environment, James said that elimination of budget holder overspending was “vital”.
“There is obviously a finite resource of pounds available, so across a trust, if one school overspends for some reason, the only way to cover that pound is from pounds from another school, which is not really an option,” James insisted. “The only way a school can operate is by spending within its means, and part of our work around financial understanding is maximising the value we get for our spend. So, understanding what your staffing is and all the rest of it, which is what IMP Planner helps with, but what Purchasing allows is to assess how important one potential aspect of spend is compared to others. It really helps to paint the entire picture, rather than a very narrow view.”
James continued: “Now we have Purchasing, which works better for the way Vantage wants its schools to operate, we expect the schools to be doing what they should be doing to control their finances, and use the system to its maximum. We are working with IMP on budget-holder reporting, and the team have been really good as we have gone through this process. I have been really impressed with IMP’s desire to seek out feedback rather than just receive it.”
For James, success for the Trust’s partnership with IMP is that it “works and keeps working”. However, the evolution of IMP products is also key. “As things change, and as new information comes to light, we need flexibility to not just take the software that was working but adapt to the world at the time,” he said. “We know that in two years things will not be where they are today, but I have faith that Purchasing and Planner will not be the same either and will flex with the changes that have to happen. That is what success looks like. Not standing still. The software bending to how the new world has to work.”
James added: “Vantage is an ambitious trust and is seeking to grow, rather than consolidate. Naturally we want the 10 schools already within the trust to keep improving, then taking that improvement out into new schools and becoming a larger trust. I have absolutely no fear that the implementation of IMP Planner or Purchasing into any new schools within the trust will be effectively seamless. Adding in schools. or approvers, would be really straightforward.”
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