OpenText helps reduce physical paper storage, eliminate
duplication, provide management reporting, and streamline
end-to-end “invoice-to-settle” process times
1. CUSTOMER
S U C C E S S S T O RY
Taking Control: 250,000
Vendor Invoices at
Derbyshire County Council
OpenText helps reduce physical paper storage, eliminate
duplication, provide management reporting, and streamline
end-to-end “invoice-to-settle” process times
Industry Derbyshire County Council serves a population of 750,000 and employs around 37,000 staff.
The Council is responsible for providing many services, including education, roads, and social
Public Sector: UK Local Government
care services. Some of the day-to-day finance activities of the Council produce a staggering
Customer volume of information with some 20,000 vendors, resulting in 250,000 invoices per year being
handled by the Accounts Payable team.
In late 2008, Derbyshire made the decision to implement an SAP® Enterprise Resource
Planning (ERP) system. This would form the basis for a significant programme of change,
replacing an ageing mainframe system that was becoming increasingly difficult to maintain.
Business Challenges With the mainframe IT workforce reaching retirement age and no sign of being able to keep
A Ageing mainframe system, difficult to pace with current, let alone future regulations, it was time to start the process of moving away
integrate and maintain from their bespoke, in-house-developed mainframe system.
E Efficiency drivers and cost-reduction
targets Handling vendor invoices: The old way
S Skilled knowledge workers reaching With vendor invoices arriving at numerous locations throughout the county, and a manual
retirement age process to approve and match invoices to purchase orders, it was possible for invoices to be
I Increasing difficulty in meeting new and lost before reaching the Accounts Payable team. When invoices arrived, details were manually
emerging regulations entered into the system, further increasing the likelihood of errors.
Business Solution “All this led to an inability to meet prompt payment targets. A downside was that early or even
prompt settlement discounts could not be claimed. Gaining a clear picture of the Council’s
I OpenText Vendor Invoice Management
for SAP® Solutions (sold by SAP as financial liability at any point in time was an almost insurmountable task. Change was definitely
SAP Invoice Management by OpenText) needed,” says Chris Woodhouse, Finance Lead Officer (SAP), Derbyshire County Council.
Business Benefits Selecting the right solution
I Greater efficiency in vendor invoice In early 2009, Derbyshire looked at the feasibility of adding the capability of SAP to handle
processing vendor invoices in a more efficient way. Business requirements were scoped, along with a
I Reduction in processing times stated objective of using a commercially available, out-of-the-box solution that didn’t require
I More flexible, detailed reporting and customisation or significant configuration. This was the basis of their SAP ERP project and any
analysis now possible additional capability had to follow this model. They also wanted the comfort that any solution
I Ability to identify bottlenecks in selected was proven and well supported. They took up the chance to visit an existing
processes and take remedial action OpenText Vendor Invoice Management for SAP® Solutions customer and were impressed
I Full audit trail, retention, and with what they saw.
disposition scheduling “We selected OpenText, then set about the project in April 2009 with the objective of going
live with not only SAP but also OpenText in April 2010; an aggressive timeframe,”
Woodhouse says.