Hutchinson Engineering Cuts Two Days a Week of Manual Reporting While Improving Delivery Reliability with Business Central Insights

Company Background

Hutchinson Engineering, a Northern Ireland-based manufacturing firm, upgraded its ERP platform to Microsoft Business Central and required a modern reporting solution to replace its legacy SQL-based reporting. Heavy reliance on Excel had made reporting inefficient, error-prone, and inconsistent. By implementing Business Central Insights (BCI), Hutchinson regained trust in its data, identified and resolved bottlenecks, and significantly improved on-time delivery reporting. Within the first year, the company reduced 2 days of weekly manual effort, uncovered hidden data issues, and enabled leadership to make faster, more informed decisions based on live, consistent information.

Business and Technical Challenges

When Hutchinson moved to SaaS-based Business Central, their established ways of accessing data disappeared overnight. The IT team could no longer pull information directly, and the stopgap solution, Excel, quickly revealed its flaws. Reports became inconsistent, manual effort ballooned, and confidence in the numbers plummeted. Without a centralised reporting method, different departments pulled their own figures, often producing conflicting results, a problem magnified by the complexity of Hutchinson’s multi-stage manufacturing process.

"We moved to SaaS and suddenly couldn’t get to the information we needed, causing all sorts of headaches," said Neville Glenn, IT Manager at Hutchinson.

As Robert Walker, Business Improvement Manager, put it: "There was no single source of truth, and every department had its own version of the figures, it was a reporting nightmare."

The complexity of Hutchinson’s manufacturing process only made things harder. Many of their products are made up of hundreds of parts and subassemblies, passing through multiple work centres, such as cutting, folding, fabrication, and painting, with delays possible at any stage. Standard reports couldn’t easily provide a complete, accurate picture, and bottlenecks were often hidden until they caused wider problems.

The result was a fragmented reporting environment where more time was spent validating numbers than acting on them. Monthly production meetings were driven by outdated data, and performance reviews relied on static spreadsheets that took days to prepare.

Why They Chose Business Central Insights

Hutchinson evaluated other reporting options and the possibility of building their own Power BI reports, but found them too complex, too limited, or too slow to deliver value.

"We looked at Jet Reports, but it’s Excel based, you need to be quite experienced. It’s clunky, it’s hard to build, and wasn’t giving us the visuals we needed," said Neville Glenn, IT Manager.

With over 400 ready-made reports covering multiple business areas, BCI offered an immediate, out-of-the-box solution that required no extra infrastructure or development effort. The breadth of content meant they could focus on the reports that mattered most, such as on-time delivery, while knowing other capabilities were ready to explore as their needs evolved.

"We needed a solution that delivered answers instantly. BCI did exactly that, and we were impressed by how quickly we could access our data and start using it to improve our business,"  Neville continued. By seeing how the reports were structured, the team also gained a better understanding of how Business Central data fits together, improving their own Power BI skills in the process.

Given the speed of implementation, the range of insights available, and the ability to adapt reports for their unique manufacturing processes, Neville said, "The cost was easy to justify, given the exceptional value it provides,"

Benefits

Since implementing BCI, Hutchinson Engineering has realised several important benefits that have transformed its business operations:

• Restored Confidence in Reporting:
  With BCI implemented across Sales, Manufacturing, Finance, Inventory, and Purchasing, Hutchinson achieved measurable operational improvements, starting with a renewed trust in their data. On-Time Delivery, a critical KPI for their largest customers, is now tracked daily through BCI’s Sales On-Time Delivery report. The COO uses it to drill into customer-level delays, driving cross-department accountability and faster problem-solving.

  "The COO actively uses the report and thinks they’re brilliant. Drilling down by customer and month has sparked a level of dialogue and accountability that simply didn’t exist before," Robert Walker

• Tailored Insights for Manufacturing:
  Working closely with BCI’s team, Hutchinson adapted standard reports to fit their unique multi-stage production process. "We asked Dejan for a few tweaks and ideas, and the results have been amazing! Now we have the exact views we need to make decisions quickly," Neville Glenn These tailored dashboards provide complete visibility from cutting to painting, helping teams address issues before they impact delivery.

• Improved Supplier Performance:
  Hutchinson now applies BCI’s On-Time analytics to evaluate supplier reliability. By monitoring whether materials and components arrive as scheduled, the company can hold suppliers accountable to KPIs and strengthen procurement planning across its supply chain.

• Greater Internal Efficiency:
  Each department is now treated as an internal “customer,” with BCI tracking handovers between production stages. This approach has exposed hidden bottlenecks and improved internal routing efficiency, giving Hutchinson a clear picture of performance at every stage.

  "The reports didn’t just give us answers, they exposed problems and pointed us toward solutions," Robert Walker

• Time Savings and Better Decision-Making:
  Before BCI, teams spent up to two days per week validating data, and preparing static spreadsheets. With automated Power BI dashboards, that time is now focused on analysis and decision-making.

  "Our leaders are over the moon, they’re finally making decisions rather than spending time pulling reports," Neville Glenn

• Increased Reporting Adoption Across the Business:
  Since implementing BCI, teams across Hutchinson have embraced reporting more widely. Users now find it easy to explore dashboards, create ad hoc views, and share insights with confidence, knowing the data is accurate and up to date.
  This shift has encouraged a stronger data-driven culture, with employees at every level using reports to support day-to-day decisions and continuous improvement initiatives.

• Improved Customer and Delivery Performance:
  BCI has also helped Hutchinson enhance delivery reliability and customer satisfaction. With real-time visibility across production and purchasing, the company can now identify and resolve potential delays early, ensuring more orders are delivered on time and to the standard customers expect.
  Improved coordination between departments has shortened lead times and strengthened relationships with key clients who rely on Hutchinson’s precision and dependability.

Future Use:

With a solid reporting foundation in place, Hutchinson is now focused on expanding usage and training across the business. While some teams are already customising reports and applying advanced filters, others are just beginning to explore what the platform can do. To support this, internal surveys and targeted tutorials are planned to encourage broader adoption and ensure all departments can tap into the same level of insight.

There’s also a drive to improve Power BI skills across the company, so users feel confident applying filters, creating bookmarks, and tailoring reports. As production data capture improves through better time recording and back-flushing, Hutchinson expects to make fuller use of reports such as actual vs. estimated cost analysis in Sales.

They also aim to incorporate more custom fields into reports and make fuller use of the many BCI reports they already have, gradually expanding beyond their current “highlight reel” of key reports.

"Internally we’re looking at using the data to drive decision-making, for example, tracking performance per internal on-time delivery. That’s our next step," said Robert Walker.

"We’ve only scratched the surface." added Neville Glenn. "But already the value is clear, it’s saving us time, giving us confidence in our data, and opening up insights we never had before. We’re genuinely excited about what comes next,”