Who Are They?
CARE is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization. For 75 years, CARE has led the way to a better life for the world’s most vulnerable people. In 2020, CARE worked in over 100 countries, reaching more than 90 million people through 1,300 projects. CARE works around the globe to save lives, defeat poverty, and achieve social justice.
Ask
The CARE Humanitarian Affairs Department was looking for an Operations Support System. CARE’s objective for adopting this software was to automate core operation functions through greater oversight/control, quicker decisions, and higher efficiency in order to support quality humanitarian responses.
The CARE team was in search for an operations system that would give them the ability to answer questions any time and in real-time. Questions like:
What is being done? Is it being done correctly? Who is doing what? Is it being done quickly and cost-effectively? Is it being done consistently and well?
Answer
We provided a software solution for real-time management of inventory, property, commodity/supplies and fleet at the country office level. It was developed to give CARE the visibility, accountability, transparency, efficiency, and reliability in their operations that they were seeking. It is a cloud-based software with functionality on web browsers and mobile scanning devices. The package incorporated the movement of donations, products, assets, food, trainings, and supplies. Scanning capabilities were created to speed up the process of organizing and dispensing supplies.
Food and non-food items are both managed by the inventory management modules. The activity on them is traced from receipt into their warehouse to issuing of those food and non-food items to whomever will be utilizing them. They use the software to tag products with the fund code and project ID so there is assurance that money donated for a specific cause ends up at that destination. Office inventory is also tracked in the same system along with assets, such as vehicles, reservations and utilizations.
For CARE’s specific project activities, some of our base features were adjusted, including but not limited to the asset management module (as per CUSA property management policy) and a fleet management module.
Flowtrac was first piloted in Sierra Leone, West Africa, and scaled up in Ghana and Nigeria (Jan-Jun 2021), followed by Niger/Burkina Faso and Mali (Jul-Dec 2021). Our Flowtrac Customer Success Team met with the CARE OSS project leaders regularly as we implemented the software in phases and as Flowtrac was gradually implemented by CARE in more and more countries.
Outcomes
According to the CARE team, the Flowtrac solution has proven to be an “innovative and easy to use tool” with a “smooth learning curve.”
The automation of the operations have streamlined their humanitarian projects. Automation of inventory and property has enhanced visibility, increased turn around time, added better controls, and raise efficiency.
The fleet management now includes a process of reviewing and updating reservations and use within their system. Policy and business process compliances are more easily maintained.
Moreover, there’s been significantly improved accountability and transparency as a result of the completeness of records and proper tracking of movements. At the same time, historical data such as for audits and audit trails is readily accessible to the approved system user. Reporting on data such as product activity, stock movement, and balances have helped administrators share information as well as make well-informed decisions based on the analysis of their reports. Their Flowtrac system helps decision makers manage expenses that go to program services.
We would like to thank the UPS Foundation for being so instrumental in connecting us with Care International. This continues to be a collaborative effort dear to our hearts.
“[Flowtrac] OSS helped us reduce huge amount of paperwork on transfers, issuing and receiving from one location to the other.”
Edward Kanu, M&E Officer CARE Sierra Leone