SAP Accounts Payable Automation
SAP Accounts Payable Automation
SAP Accounts Payable Automation is the dream of most AP departments. Processing invoices can be a very manual and tedious process for Accounts Payable departments. However tedious, they realize the importance of processing these vendor invoices quickly and in a timely manner. A/P departments all to well know the challenges they face, the enormous amount of time involved in manually keying invoices, researching exceptions, waiting for approval to pay, file and store. In addition to these challenges, Accounts Payable departments have no visibility into the progression of the invoice until it is posted in SAP.
Have the Invoice Tracking Center PDF sent to you here SAP Accounts Payable Automation can best be achieved with the Verbella Invoice Tracking Center (ITC). When used with Tungsten (formerly Kofax) Capture and Tungsten Transformation (formerly Kofax Transformation Module or KTM) applications (or other OCR software) for classification and data extraction, and a Certified SAP ArchiveLink Content Repository for Document Storage, it’s a complete solution.
Our solution provides invoice capture, starting with the initial receipt of the invoice, whether by mail (paper), electronically via email or fax, EDI or from vendor portals. The invoices are then processed with an OCR engine, such as Tungsten Automation’s software, that classifies the invoices and extracts the data. An SAP Certified Content Server is used to store the document image, and the meta data and a link to the image is passed directly to the ITC record inside of SAP. Once in the ITC, the documents are validated, run through a duplicate check, and then can be auto posted, or for non-PO invoices routed for coding and approval, and then posted.
The ITC when used with Tungsten Automation and an SAP Content Server, deliver automated data entry, duplicate checking, audit functionality, non-PO approvals, PO exception handling, Auto-Posting and visibility into the Invoice process all delivered inside of SAP.
SAP Accounts Payable Automation – ITC Solution Features
- Seamless integration into any SAP Certified Archivelink content Repository.
- OCR Integration with Tungsten Capture via the SAP Certified Verbella Export Connector comes standard.
- ITC resides inside of SAP, delivered via SAP Transports or SAINT Package for Easy configuration.
- Embedded Document Imaging Viewer for quick and easy document reference.
- Auto-Posting available for PO and Non-PO invoices.
- Process emails from a scanner or directly via email.
Single Note and complete Note thread available for each invoice
Complete Invoice History, Know who did what and when
Customized duplicate check configurable based on ITC document Type
-
Approval and coding via Email for Non SAP users
-
Ad-hoc or automatic routing for approvals
-
Original Approval and Coding emails are archived and link to the ITC Record
Open PO line-item data and Vendor Master data extraction programs, that are used by Tungsten Automation’s included image data extraction.
Additional Features the ITC include:
- Upload of excel file for GL coding for large line-item invoices.
- Original Invoices linked to both the accounting document and the ITC record.
- Mass Printing / downloading of multiple documents at the same time.
- Hyper-Links to Vendor master, PO, and accounting documents.
- Simulate Routing and re-routing of invoices.
- ITC will try to Auto a PO Invoices after GR is performed, if it was missing a Goods Receipt when it was initially processed.
- Auto-Posting of Utility and Logistic invoices available through the ITC Auto Coding Configuration.
- Reporting on the number A/P touches, workflow duration, accruals and dozens of reports possible.
- Additional analytical reporting via Tungsten Analytics and Timeline PI.
- Payment document updated for each record.
- Automatic clearing of parked documents posted outside of the ITC.
- Uses SAP Authorization to control access, including company Code.
- Integration into the Taulia web Portal for Invoice submission and early payment discounts.
Limitations exist when Processing Vendor Invoices in SAP
- No visibility into the status of the document until it is either parked or posted in SAP.
- A/P Department no idea how many or what invoices need to be processed before they are entered into SAP.
- A/P managers can not track individual invoices until it is either posted or paid in SAP, so managers have no idea how long a invoice has been waiting for approval.
- Can not quickly process invoices if they are sent to the wrong approver.
- No out of the box linking of document images to the SAP Transaction.
- No email based Coding or approval.
- Scanning and OCR software is not included with SAP.
- Processing generally involves multiple SAP Screens and transactions.
- No reporting on the invoice process.
- SAP only lets you retrieve and print 1 document at a time.
How Does an Accounts Payable Automation solution from Verbella overcome these limitations?
- ITC offers complete cradle to grave visibility into the entire Invoice Processing.
- A/P Department can instantly know the status of each invoice before they are entered into SAP.
- A/P manager track and determine how long a invoice has been waiting for approval.
- Allows invoices to be re-routed if rejected because the wrong approver was selected.
- Duplicates determined before entry into SAP, Display images and accounting document of suspected duplicate invoices.
- Identify offenders – Vendors who routinely submit duplicate invoices, or problematic invoices, approvers who need to be reminded to approve invoices.
- Determine how long it takes to process an average invoice and identify bottle necks in the invoice process.
- A single point of entry, a single screen to process all Invoices.
- Much Faster Invoice Processing, Less cost per invoice to process.
- Less duplicate invoices – more time for processing invoice exceptions.
- Quicker turnaround time on Vendor calls, better relations with Vendors.