Enrolment, payment and shipment from a single source
From the first brochure request to the final payment instalment: the complete administrative heart of a distance-learning organisation in one system.
NHA, a specialist in distance learning, worked with a landscape in which enrolment, payment, shipping and marketing each had their own place. With Polaris we built MACS: the ERP system that brings those processes together, in use in the Netherlands, Germany and Curaçao.
A distance-learning course is an administrative process spanning years
A student requests a brochure, enrols, pays in instalments, receives course materials at home, perhaps pauses for a while and eventually completes the course. That runs over years, and every step touches a different part of the organisation.
Everything hangs off the same enrolment
Financial administration, the warehouse and the marketing department all look at the same student, but each needs different data. Once that data lives in separate systems, things go wrong in precisely the cases that matter most: a changed payment schedule, a paused course, a return shipment. MACS brought those processes into one model, so that a change in one place carries through everywhere.
What came together in one system
MACS was not a partial application but the administrative heart of the organisation.
From request to completion
- Relationship management, requests, pre-enrolments and enrolments, with a separate route for the German market.
- Course catalogue, study pace and instalments configurable per student, including pausing and resuming a course.
- Correspondence from within the system: printable letters and bulk actions instead of manual work per file.
Instalments that have to stay correct for years
- Payment instalments, payment methods and payment arrangements per enrolment, with discounts and reminders in the same model.
- Payment requests and adjustments to them, separated by what the back office may do and what financial administration does.
- Multiple countries means multiple currencies, account structures and direct-debit rules — built in, not worked around.
Shipping lists and pick lists from the same model
- Course materials are shipped based on where a student is in their programme, not on a separate order list.
- Shipping schedules, pick lists for the warehouse and returns processing as part of the same administration.
- The warehouse works with lists that match the payment status, with no intermediate step or retyping.
Distributing brochures and measuring the result
- Brochure requests and distribution run through the same system as the enrolments they lead to.
- Every enrolment records which campaign or advertisement brought the student in.
- That makes the return on a campaign readable from actual enrolments and payments, not from requests alone.
Hundreds of screens from one model
MACS was built with Polaris. An ERP of this size consists of hundreds of screens and forms; building those by hand and keeping them consistent for years is exactly where systems like this break down. Because everything comes from one validated model, a change in the model carries through to every screen that depends on it — and the system keeps pace with new requirements per country.