Oakroyd TV Casting Agency

Paula McKie runs a casting agency for TV called 'agency Oakroyd' who needed something really simple to manage a growing list of artistes and TV production contracts. "I'm not a techie, so having something just so visually easy to understand is great. Even I get it!" said Paula.

A one-stop view of all artistes

"Bento provides me with a one-stop view of all my artistes, their dates and any payments I've made or about to make. And as it works seamlessly with iCal, Address Book and Numbers it was really easy to get up and running quickly. Quite neat really."

"Managing and using the information in Bento is easy" said Paula. "For example, I can search for a particular contract, say just those appearing on ITV's Emmerdale, or contracts by whether they're completed or still scheduled to do."

Here's a quick overview of how Bento to fits into Paula's workflow to help her run her business even more efficiently by bringing all her information together:

• Events are stored in iCal (an event is a day on set where artistes are required) and easily viewed through Bento
• Contacts – whether artistes or production contacts, are available in Bento because they are stored in Address Book
• An 'Artistes Details' form in Bento draws from an artistes smart-folder in Address Book, to which additional information is then added in Bento
• An 'Events' form in Bento draws from a specific calendar within iCal
• Each of the 'Event' forms are then linked as a sub-form of the other, so Paula can get information about a) artistes by events and b) events by artistes
• A 'Payments Book' is created directly in Bento, which is also a sub-form on the Artistes Details form. Paula simply 'cuts-n-pastes' lines from Numbers into the Payment Book in Bento.

Allocates jobs fairly

Bento helps Paula to not only stay organised but allows her to allocate jobs fairly. She simply forwards the 'Events' pages with assigned artistes to the casting department at ITV and then uses the 'Artistes' pages to balance the artistes' workloads. "I like to be fair and having an instant view allows me to see which artiste did continuity work last time and who hasn't for a while, so the faces should always look fresh on TV and all my artistes should get the same balance of opportunities. I honestly couldn't do this without Bento" adds Paula.

"The next thing we want to do is get everything synchronised to my mobile, so that I've always got current information to hand. Can't wait."

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