A solution that supports digitization, the process of processing and archiving of all incoming documentation, as well as archiving and distribution of outgoing documentation. The emphasis regarding this solution is the digitization of incoming/outgoing documents. The solution enables usage by one company or within the entire group while covering the work in an unlimited number of geographical locations.

The main feature of the system is a specialized documents repository certified by the SAP ERP system for managing a large amount of unstructured content, as well as the ability to access content directly or through SAP systems, as well as other external systems.

The EUZ solution enables the recording and archiving of all documents:

  • Incoming mail – paper documentation, fax messages, e-mail, EDI messages coming to the company
  • Outgoing mail – documents that are created in the company and sent to business partners
  • Internal mail – documents sent between company organizational units.

Main characteristics and advantages of using the system:

  • High performance and availability
  • Scalability, extensibility without practical restrictions (number of locations, documents, processes, users, etc.)
  • Independence of geographical distribution
  • Rich functionality
  • Ease of use and implementation.

Other significant system features:

  • A unique repository for all external content, for content created in the ERP system, LOB applications and for other content created in different systems
  • The possibility of developing additional solutions and modules inside and outside the SAP environment
  • The ability to access content directly or through SAP system or other external systems.

Incoming mail management

In addition to the standard functionalities of the electronic registration record, the solution additionally enables:

  • Unique document identification using a bar code
  • Digitization and optical character recognition (OCR) when processing paper documents
  • Distribution and supervision of work on documents
  • Indexing various formats of documents in their entirety
  • Permanent archiving of documents
  • Search capability for authorized users both within the ERP system (SAP, Navision) system and for other users outside that system.

Integration with the scanning software and options:

  • Integration with scanning and optical character recognition software
  • Barcode label printing, also used as a separator when scanning a large number of documents at once
  • Automatically connecting scanned documents to entered data
  • Permanent archiving into a single repository.

Optical character recognition and additional functionality:

  • Barcode recognition and unique identification
  • Support for recognizing specific Croatian characters of the alphabet
  • Search the document for the entire content of the document (full-text search).

Other important functionalities:

  • Attachments – it is possible to add one or more documents that form a whole with the basic document
  • References – e-mail or any other document may be linked to the other registered document in the system and form together with a logical whole, or are otherwise linked
  • Multiple document formats – documents can be stored in several formats, for example, outgoing mail can be saved as a source document in Word format and as a digitized document (visible signature and stamp)
  • Re-scan – it is possible to repeat the document scanning procedure if the quality is not satisfactory
  • Search – the solution enables multiple types of searches, searches by metadata and/or document content.

Outgoing mail management

Additional important functionalities for outgoing mail:

  • Pre-reservation of an identification number and distribution to clerks who prepare documents within the company
  • Unique identification number for all outgoing mail (documents)
  • A unique identification of all outgoing documents stored in the system
  • The possibility of tracking other relevant data when sending (e.g. the weight of the shipment) and the possibility of preparing a mailing list (e.g. the Receipt Book for the Croatian Post).

Internal mail management

Featured additional functionalities for internal mail:

  • Registration and records of all internal documents
  • Enabled online access to all internal documents (according to access rights)
  • Tracking and monitoring all steps of internal mail processing.

Incoming invoices management

The invoices processing and archiving solution is a system for optimizing the entire process which includes recording, digitizing and processing of a large number of invoices and archiving them in order to meet legal obligations. The company uses this solution to process all types of invoices of member companies so that one company is in charge of central processing of all invoices for the Group of Companies.
The solution consists of the following components that are integrated and allow 360° view on invoices.

The components of the system are:
– Electronic registration record for all incoming invoices (paper and electronic)
– An incoming invoices scanning system that, in addition to scanning and reading barcodes, also enables smart IDR data extraction from the scanned image
– Application for verification of incoming invoices
– Services and applications for archiving and reviewing the whole group invoice’s archives (incoming and outgoing).

The software solution for processing and archiving incoming invoices is intended for SAP and Navision users who want a complete solution for processing incoming invoices – a solution that provides central processing of all incoming invoices (paper and electronic), digitization of paper or presentation of electronic invoices and archive in the document and records management system OpenText Content Manager, as well as the use of invoices images together with the metadata in SAP FI module of the SAP ERP system or Navision ERP system.

The solution is customized to work in large companies with centralised processing access to rationalise the processing costs, which also enables the review and verification of invoices from any remote location while respecting security aspects and access rights to the individual invoice images and the related data.

The outgoing and incoming invoices archiving subsystem is also adapted for use in large companies and is optimised to archive about 600,000 invoices per day per server with a maximum upload of 900,000 invoices per day per server. The system can also be scaled horizontally, thus multiplying its bandwidth.

The main advantages of using this solution

  • An invoice processing solution can be connected to multiple ERP systems (e.g. SAP systems and Navision in the INA group) and a solution that supports working with a large number of accounts and a distributed organisation in different locations
  • Solution based on systems from large and recognised technology manufacturers that guarantee quality and reliability such as Micro Focus Content Manager documents and records management system as well as Kofax Capture or KTM system for data retrieval, digitisation and extraction
  • A solution that is stable, complete and proven in practice. TOP accounting services Ltd- a subsidiary company of the INA Group that provides accounting services for all members of the group – is using the solution for INA Group companies; the solution has been used since 2006 and has been constantly upgraded with additional functionality
  • A solution in which all invoice processing goes through a single central system which significantly increases control and significantly simplifies access to essential information for users with appropriate permissions (paper – manual indexing, paper – OCR, electronic)
  • A solution in which there is no circulation of paper documents and “early archiving” of incoming invoices is used in all situations, and electronic documents are accessed from various companies
  • A solution that has a permeability archive and archives all types of invoices for the needs of the company and legal regulations. All incoming and outgoing invoices are archived (e.g. retail gas stations, INA Card accounts, etc.) – 70 TB of annual archives with a tendency to grow, all in a system that is the concept of archiving in accordance with legal regulations (OpenText Content Manager)
  • A solution that fully supports the new modern (HTML 5) Web interface. Now, even operators working on entering invoices can do their job in the Web interface (not just verifiers), which significantly simplifies the process and implementation

Description of the invoice processing

The following describes the processing of incoming and outgoing invoices:

  1. Paper incoming invoices processing – two ways to scan and process invoice images
  2. Processing of electronic incoming invoices
  3. Processing of outgoing invoices.

Processing incoming paper invoices
All paper invoices arrive at a single location in the country, to a single mailbox which has been arranged with the post office (followed by one address). In this way, all invoices from different companies from the group located in different locations in the country arrive at a single address.

After entering, the invoice receives a barcode label with a unique document identification, and scanning is possible in two ways:

  • Identification of barcodes and saving invoice images
  • Identification of barcodes, invoices data, and image and invoice information saving.

Automatic KTM data extraction is used for vendors who still submit a large number of paper invoices, for which EDI communication cannot be performed and thus switch to e-Invoices exchange. Automatic invoice image data extraction is used by The Intelligent Document Recognition (IDR) principles embedded within the Kofax Transformation Module (KTM), an upgrade of the Kofax Capture system.

The KTM system speeds up the data entry process and more data is transmitted to the ERP system than sets that are entered manually, which reduces the invoices processing time in the ERP system.

The application for verifying incoming invoices also provides insight into the data on the decisions made. Each decision (approval/rejection) that is part of the incoming invoice verification and certification process, is documented in such a way that it is possible to determine who made the decision, when and which decision was made.

Processing through Kofax without KTM extraction is a variation of the process described above in which all invoices are transferred to the ERP system only with the basic data entered.

Electronic incoming invoices processing
The processing of incoming e-Invoices is specific in a way that the e-Invoice automatically enters the OpenText CM system via the orchestration service (BizTalk) and is available with all the data in the EUZ application. The invoice is also automatically stored in the invoice archive.

Electronic invoices for implementation use EDI communication that defines a specific invoice format. EDI communication as one of the basic elements implies the signing of an agreement on EDI invoices exchange which confirms and defines all the details of the realization of communication. EDI communication can be performed also without a contract and thus significantly speeds up the process of invoice processing, but the electronic document, in this case, is not legally valid, so it is necessary to keep the original paper invoice of the supplier in the physical archive.

Outgoing invoices archiving
For outgoing invoices, the OpenText CM system is used only as an archive and all outgoing invoices are archived in the mentioned archive.
Invoices from the ERP system are delivered to the BizTalk orchestration system, which creates the invoice EDI format and archives it in the Opentext CM archive and sends it to the other party (customer).

As previously mentioned, the archive on the Micro Focus CM system stores all outgoing invoices and all the incoming invoices as well.

The main characteristics of the Archive on the Micro Focus CM system are:
– Bandwidth – storage of max. 900,000 invoices per day per archive server
– Ensuring legal regulations
– Secure storage of electronic invoices and excretion management after the legal deadline is set.
– Availability of invoices within the archive and the search by basic data relevant to the archive.