Cedar Group Introduces Cedar eProfessional for Staffing Agencies.

Business/Technology Editors

HAVERHILL, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 8, 2000

Integrated time-management and financial-accounting software helps

staffing agencies increase payment accuracy, improve billing

efficiency, and analyze business

Cedar Group US, Inc., the Haverhill, Mass.-based provider of enterprise business software and service solutions, today announced Cedar eProfessional, an integrated time-capture, billing, and financial-reporting system designed for organizations that provide contractor services to clients. Companies such as temporary staffing agencies can leverage Cedar eProfessional to eliminate time-consuming and labor-intensive billing practices and to improve business analysis.

"The temporary-staffing sector has enjoyed exceptional growth over the last ten years, but the technology solutions that support this market have not kept pace," said Art King, vice president, product marketing, for Cedar Group. "The industry has relied on expensive in-house legacy solutions that only partially accommodate business requirements, have little flexibility, and are unable to support organizational growth. Cedar eProfessional is the first comprehensive time accounting and management system developed specifically for agencies supplying consultants to different clients at different sites, on different projects, and at different rates. The system ensures full control over consultants' work hours, billing, and payment."

Cedar eProfessional Streamlines Payment and Billing, Enables Business Analysis

Because Cedar eProfessional includes integrated time-management and financial accounting software tailored for the staffing industry, agencies can synchronize their back-office processes so that they can accurately pay employees and independent contractors, bill clients, and extrapolate trends from their financial data. By providing a single input point for data, Cedar eProfessional simultaneously reduces manual effort and minimizes errors.

Beyond automation of data entry, Cedar eProfessional gives management an immediate view of overall financial results, as well as reporting tools for in-depth analysis such as profit and loss by salesperson, customer, region, department, office, employee, and/or subcontractor. With such business-analysis capabilities, agencies can easily determine where costs are out of line with charge rates; monitor utilization of their resource pools; and more effectively balance workloads, resulting in happier customers and employees.

By streamlining data-entry and invoice-matching processes to avoid rekeying of data, increasing productivity, and increasing access to decision-support information, Cedar eProfessional enables agencies to improve service to clients, employees, and independent contractors and consultants. In addition, its inherent flexibility and scalability mean Cedar eProfessional can accommodate both current needs and future growth.

Pricing and Availability

Cedar eProfessional encompasses the proven Cedar eTime (time management and accounting) and Cedar eFinancials (core business financial accounting) solutions, so, although it is a new offering, it already has a track record of success in organizations worldwide. Cedar eProfessional can be run by any organization that can support Oracle. Windows or Windows NT is required for the front end.

The license fee for Cedar eProfessional depends upon the number of users and timesheets supported and typically ranges between $50,000 and $300,000. For more information about Cedar eProfessional, call 1-800-825-7899 or write to [e-mail].

About Cedar Group

Cedar Group US, Inc., is a member of Cedar Group Plc (LSE: CED.L - News), the publicly traded provider of Oracle-based enterprise business solutions. Founded in 1983, Cedar Group is fully quoted on the London Stock Exchange (CED.L). Specializing in powerful, scaleable applications that can be implemented quickly and cost-effectively, Cedar Group offers Cedar eFinancials (financial management and reporting), Cedar eTime (time management and accounting), Cedar eDRIVE (fleet management), Cedar eFlow (workflow and document imaging), Cedar eContent (data warehouse management); and Cedar eCustomer (customer resource management). The solutions are also available through the application service provider (ASP) model.

More than 500 blue-chip organizations from a variety of market sectors and countries rely on Cedar Group products to run their businesses, including Daimler-Chrysler, Siemens, Levi Strauss of Canada, CAIS Internet, Dennis Publishing, and CFS Americas. Cedar Group's corporate headquarters are located north of Boston at 57 Wingate Street, Haverhill, MA 01832, and the company maintains sales offices throughout North America. For more information, contact Cedar Group at [phone] or [e-mail], or visit the Cedar Group web site at http://www.cedargroupus.com.

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