There is no doubt that the company’s finance should be well organized. A small firm can coordinate it by itself and keep order with binders and folders. In big companies keeping the workflow of invoices and other documents smooth and running could be a real challenge.
Work with paper invoices might be complicated. Employees must follow procedures, collect required approvals and signatures, and at last archive invoices in a proper way. It’s a lot of work and a lot of things can go wrong.
Searching superior who are supposed to approve an invoice, binders stuffed of writings, missing documents – that’s commonplace in firms with paper invoice workflow. These things can cause a delay in work and overdue invoices not only don’t build a good corporate image but also may be a reason for conflict with partners.
In a situation like this management can buy more binders or… make a real change. If the company doesn’t want to drown in office supplies, it should reorganize its workflow just like VIALUTIONS’ customer.
Until recently incoming paper invoices were passed from hand to hand for approval, annotated, and paid timely. Many employees participated in this process. When one of them got sick or went on vacation, workflow stopped and payment was late.
Everybody who works with documents knows that scheme. It’s common in many companies, but it does not have to be like that. We know that keeping control of workflow is a necessity, so we make it simple with the electronic workflow of invoices we created – INAPS.
We don’t make a revolution in our customer’s headquarters – we just transform the company’s workflow into a digital version. It’s like transforming Fiat to Mercedes. You will drive the same road, but much more convenient!
For our client, we created an invoice approval system based on Microsoft SharePoint. Incoming documents go to the system via scanner or email-box. To automatize this process, we used an OCR – technology which can recognize the invoices automatically, no matter they are scans, photos, or PDFs. Thanks to this every document goes to the right category and it is easy to find and manage.
An employee, who is responsible to service that contractor, registers a document. He annotates it and starts the approval process to superiors and other employees.
Every document is easy to find by the search component of the solution. Invoices are divided by categories determined by the customer – each of them is like a paper folder but transparent, organized, and easily accessible. The workflow of invoices became transparent, fast, and easy to control. Payments are made timely. Isn’t it exactly like it should be?