Deltek Insight 2010: Manage, Review, and Approve Invoices – Paperless…While Accelerating Cash Flow and Improving Project Manager Communications

VI-248: Manage, Review, and Approve Invoices – Paperless!…While Accelerating Cash Flow and Improving Project Manager Communications

Presented by:

Richard Sargent, EMA

Steve Stolz, Central Consulting Group

1

Introductions

Richard Sargent, EMA- [email protected]

Steve Stolz, Central Consulting Group- [email protected]

EMA, Inc. Background• Consulting firm working in the Water/Wastewater Utility and Municipal Markets (Technology,

Engineering, Management)• Providing services to clients since 1975• Employ 150 employees located in over 20 offices throughout the United States and Canada with HQ

in St. Paul, MN• Multi-Company / Multi-Currency • Live on Vision March 1, 2009

Central Consulting Group, a Deltek Premier Partner:• Serving 1200 Deltek clients; 600 using vision nationwide• 30 Consultants and staff throughout US• Software solutions for AEC and other professional services firms• Deep understanding business processes and analytics• Expertise to create and adapt software to how a firm really works• Develop high-impact solutions to improve efficiency.

Copyright © 2010 Deltek, Inc. 2

mailto:[email protected]

Business Challenges

• Improve overall process efficiencies– Reduce paper shuffling and related costs

• Increase management visibility into process– Looking through the windshield versus rear-view mirror

– Proactive versus reactive

• Improve information available to PMs– What was billed in the previous month?

– Visibility (job-to-date) against the budget?

– Inability to anticipate outstanding sub-consultant invoices

• Improve early warning via trends and statistics reporting


Internal Invoice Cycle – Before

Project Time Entry

(Step 1)

Create Paper/PDF

Invoice (Accounting)

(Step 2)

Email ProjectReports to Reviewers

(Accounting)

(Step 3)

Email Invoice to Reviewers

(Accounting)

(Step 4)

PM Prints Invoices

(Reviewer)

(Step 5)

PM Marks Up Invoice

(Reviewer)

(Step 6)

PM Scans Marked Up

Invoice (Reviewer)

(Step 7)

Email Invoices Back to

Accounting (Reviewer)

(Step 8)

Email/Mail Approved

Invoice to Client (Accounting)

(Step 10)

Make Final Invoice Changes

(Accounting)

(Step 9)

Enter Project/Invoice

Data into Spreadsheet (Accounting)

(Step 11)

Internal Invoicing Cycle – After

Time Entry

(Step 1)

Vision Batch Billing

Create PDF Invoice/Auto Email

Notification (Accounting)

(Step 2)

Electronic Invoicing

Audit, Markup, & Set Invoice Stage

(Reviewer)

(Step 3)

E-Mail/Mail Approved PDF

Invoice to Client (Accounting)

(Step 5)

Vision Interactive Billing

Make Final Invoice Changes

(Accounting)

(Step 4)

* Invoice is routed to others via

stages

Internal Invoice Cycle – Today

• Harness the power of Vision - Batch Billing– Invoices & Unbilled Detail reports are created in batches, and automatically

moved into folders defined in the Project Info Center

• EMA’s paperless solution – Manage it electronically – the process:– Invoices automatically flagged for “Review”

– Email generated to PMs notifying they have invoices to review

• Project Managers, within a single application:– Markup invoices

– Insert communications

– Set return “Stage” (e.g. Approved as Noted)

• Accounting makes changes via Interactive Billing and finalizes invoices

• Standardization company wide


Visibility into the Billing Cycle – Stages

• User-defined invoice “stages”

• Invoice stage is visible for each project– Accounting

– Review

– Approved as noted

– Charges not authorized by client – Do not invoice• Early warning of write-off

– Do not invoice this month

– …more

• Stage Flows– Can define multiple sets of stages

• E.g. “No Approval” and “Requires Approval”

– Stage Flows (the stages a project flows through) are assigned in the Project Info Center


Early Warning of Write-Offs


• PM delays approving invoice

• Significant percent of WIP is not billed

• Several projects for same PM show same pattern of postponed billing

• Effective Multiplier starts to drop

• Estimate to complete does not go down proportionally to work billed

• Client pays short

Accelerated Cash Flow

• Accounting Personnel– Eliminated the steps to create, print, overnight, email, etc, draft invoices and

unbilled detail reports

– Reduced decision-making time via online reporting – user defined columns

– Greater efficiency by eliminating the back-and-forth PM communication • Solution automatically reminds accounting of open draft invoices requiring approval

• Project Managers– Eliminated the need to save each PDF draft invoice, print it, mark it up, scan

it back in, and email it back

– Invoice review quicker due to resultant metrics


Invoice Flow Through Stages


PM Information Readily Availablevia User Defined Columns


Monthly Status Report


Improved PM Communications – Messages

• Messaging Between Accounting and Project Management– Invoice-related directives/notifications

– Retained forever in project history


Improved PM Communications – Invoice Markup

• PDF Markup of Both Invoice and Unbilled Detail


Performance Visibility


Q & A


Call to Action

• Try these related sessions for more information!– VI-108 Paperless Invoicing

– VI-143 Reducing Project Management Paperwork and Streamlining Processes

– VI-216 Custom Fields and Workflows to Track Contract Approvals


Deltek Insight 2010: Manage, Review, and Approve Invoices – Paperless…While Accelerating Cash Flow and Improving Project Manager Communications

Education

clientaccounting step

invoice isaudit

markup invoices

andapprove invoices

project accounting review

deltek clients

review email

pm scans email invoices