CASE STUDY

How MoFi Modernized Fund Accounting Without Missing a Beat During Audit Season

September 23, 2026

MoFi, formally known as Montana Community Development Corporation, is a nonprofit lender that provides financing and consulting services to small businesses operating just outside traditional bank lending requirements, helping them build a path back into the conventional banking system. Madison Brook, Chief Operating Officer at MoFi, led the organization’s move to NetSuite, partnering with Caravel to guide the project from the ground up. 

Challenge 

  • An Outdated Fund Accounting System: MoFi ran its accounting on MIP, an industry-standard fund accounting system among community development financial institutions, but its limitations made it the first piece of MoFi’s technology stack identified as needing an update. 
  • Disconnected Systems & Manual Processes: MoFi also relied on Concur for expense management and AvidXchange for accounts payable, with little connection between systems and a growing volume of manual work that its lean team knew would not scale. 
  • A Narrow Implementation Window: MoFi wanted to move quickly, but had to align the project with its accounting team’s busy season, including the annual audit and year-end close, without disrupting day-to-day operations. 
  • Limited In-House Accounting-System Experience: Brook had implemented other software before but had very little experience in the operations of accounting itself, making the right implementation partner just as important as the platform. 

Solution

MoFi evaluated NetSuite, Sage, and Workday, documenting its processes and connections to other tools before determining that NetSuite made the most sense, largely because of how well it connected to systems MoFi already used, including Salesforce. “I have very little experience in the operations of accounting, so we really wanted a white glove experience that could give us advice and guide us through the process,” Brook said. “That led us to a referral to Caravel as the vendor that could walk us through the entire process so we had zero interruptions on day one.” 

Caravel built a phased rollout starting with core ERP functionality, then helped MoFi sort which integrations made sense right away versus which could wait. Ramp connected cleanly to NetSuite early with relatively little lift, and MoFi brought Avalara online ahead of the broader implementation; remaining tools stay on a manual, CSV-based process while MoFi evaluates middleware to connect them later.  The most significant piece of the project was reworking MoFi’s chart of accounts, since MIP had structured MoFi’s finances entirely around fund accounting, built in nearly the opposite direction of NetSuite’s model. 

“MIP is structured completely the opposite way that NetSuite is structured,” Brook said. “We were the most worried about this change, but working closely with the Caravel team, we were able to have a really clean chart of accounts.”  Data migration required similar recalibration: MoFi initially wanted ten years of trial balances in NetSuite, a scope Caravel helped the organization reconsider. 

“We had this idea that we were going to pull 10 years of trial balances over, which is just not viable in any tool you’re going to switch to,” Brook said. “The Caravel team dug into the why behind the 10 years, and we agreed that two years really does make sense.” MoFi moved two years of trial balances into NetSuite and kept a data-only contract with MIP for older records still needed for one-off reporting, preserving its historical data alongside a system built for how it operates today. 

Outcome 

  • Automated Borrower Payment Imports: NetSuite now imports borrower payments directly from NLS, MoFi’s core lending system, replacing a process that once required entering each payment manually one at a time. 
  • Improved Bank Reconciliation: Connecting select banking accounts to NetSuite has streamlined MoFi’s reconciliation process and changed how the finance team approaches its banking partners and configuration. 
  • Clearer, More Accessible Reporting: Managers across MoFi can now log directly into NetSuite to view budget-to-actual reports and click into transactional detail, a process that was once difficult to navigate. 
  • A Cleaner Chart of Accounts Built for the Future: Moving from MIP’s fund accounting structure to NetSuite’s chart of accounts gives MoFi a foundation that is easier to configure and maintain as the organization grows. 

“Our reporting processes were all over the place,” Brook said. “It was very hard for our budget managers and senior leadership team to see where they were at budget to actual. Now, any of the managers can easily see their budget-to-actual report.”  Looking ahead, MoFi is continuing to partner with Caravel on a second phase focused on automated financial reporting and connecting its remaining tools through third-party middleware. Brook credits much of the project’s success to choosing a partner who understood nonprofit and fund accounting, and to keeping her lean, 40-person team focused on the bigger picture rather than the software alone. 

Her advice for other organizations approaching an ERP evaluation is to scope each phase with discipline from the start. “The more you can focus on phase one, the better, because you can make the transition smooth,” Brook said. “If you devote the most time to that and think about the nice-to-have things as a phase two project, that will set you up to be successful in both.” 

About Caravel 

Caravel has served more than 1,000 clients over the past decade, providing a comprehensive range of services, including accounting, strategy, business process, and technology selection. Caravel is proud to be part of the technology services group of BPM LLP, a top 40 accounting and advisory firm. 

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