Efficient AP processing

A lack of an effective electronic purchasing system and the right AP processing tool made St John’s AP process resource heavy, unstructured and devoid of visibility for key stakeholders.

With high invoice volumes across the country – exceeding 5,500 per month, St John were faced with significant costs associated with processing invoices.

• Enhanced process efficiency
  Significantly improved touchless processing volumes reducing the invoices processed outside of systems from 20% to 2%
• Improved accuracy
  On-time full payments increased from 60% to over 90% compared to the old electronic purchasing system
• Always-on finance operations
  New system allowed paperless Accounts Payable BCP and online operations for remote workers during COVID-19 Lockdowns

Company Background

Challenges Faced

The St John team realised their electronic purchasing system and Accounts Payable solution was not effective in maintaining finance operations.

St John needed a paperless system which allowed transactions in a remote environment. An effective system to process high volume transactions with minimal human intervention.

Increasing visibility for relevant stakeholders was also a challenge as the previous system did not support this. Overall, the team realised that the product they were using was not fit-for-purpose. Given the scale, distribution and complexity of the organisation, any change was going to be challenging.

St John were looking for a partner who could come in and implement a solution within the budget, a strict timeframe and ensure smooth transition for end users. This was a key initiative in their Digital Transformation journey.

How did we help?

Ricoh offered our global leading Accounts Payable automation solution – ABBYY and MediusFlow. We implemented these tools as they were the perfect fit for St John’s requirements and helped future-proof their overall finance operations.

• Simplifying Complexity
  We implemented a cloud-based procurement and AP processing solution that helped improve business efficiency by increasing the volume of invoices processed with minimal external support and improved on-time full payments.
• Overcoming Obstacles
  To address the project time constraint, we compressed the delivery timeline with our agile approach and completely re-engineered the delegation’s framework and approval workflow. We ensured control over spend and helped users with the necessary training support so they could have a positive experience with the new interface.

• Unlock Opportunities

  Over the years, we have developed a strong and trusted partnership with St John. Both teams have a strong understanding of each other’s capabilities and work well together to achieve successful business outcomes.

Solution at a Glance

• ABBYY FlexiCapture – invoice data capture
• Medius Invoice and match – Invoice processing
• Medius Procurement – purchase requisitions
• Medius Contracts – vendor contract management and matching