Streamline your ReBilling process by automating Oracle Accounts Payable, iExpenses and Projects

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• Streamline your Re-Billing process by automating
  Oracle Accounts Payable, iExpenses and Projects

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Introduction

• Rick Lackner
• Lead implementer of 170 Systems at M. A.
  Mortenson Company
• Responsible for technical rollouts and functional
  knowledge transfers during implementation period
• Other responsibilities at Mortenson include
  primary MetaFrame administrator, secondary
  general servers administrator, and secondary
  Oracle Workflow administrator

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M. A. Mortenson Company Overview

• General contractor, founded in 1954 in
  Minneapolis
• Continues to have headquarters in Minneapolis
• Today, over 1800 construction professionals
  directly employed
• Six main offices in the United States
• Over 100 projects throughout the U.S. and abroad
• All offices and projects connected with network
  hub in Minneapolis
• Key market specializations
• Elite firm in the construction of wind turbines /
  wind farms
• Focus on sports venues, cultural facilities,
  public assembly facilities, signature
  architecture projects, aviation projects, and
  large-scale hospitality / health-care projects
• FedEx Forum in Memphis, Frank-Gehry designed Walt
  Disney Concert Hall in L.A., Xcel Energy Center
  in St. Paul, Denver Art Museum

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M. A. Mortensons Oracle Financials Environment

• Hosted at On Demand
• AP, AR, Cash Management, G/L
• All users accessing Oracle and 170 Systems via
  MetaFrame
• All of Mortensons financial processes flow
  through Oracle
• Project-based business at Mortenson, so Oracle
  Projects has needed to be integrated tightly with
  Oracle Financials
• Implemented 170 Systems along with Oracle last
  year (Go Live for Oracle was Jan. 3rd, 2006 AP /
  170 Systems Go Live was Jan. 23rd)
• Vision to minimize using paper documents with
  Oracle
• In 170 Systems, implemented Locations within M.
  A. Mortenson org. to spread functionality among
  business groups

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Rebilling Process

• The Challenge Faced
• Manually processing project-related expenditures
  (invoices, expenses, time labor) is extremely
  time-intensive, costly, error-prone, often lacks
  adequate controls, and results in missed revenue.
• This is compounded by the requirement to compile
  and present customers with back-up and audit
  documentation for their invoices.

After activating 170 Systems Project Rebilling,
Mortenson has started to take advantage of
avoiding the inefficiencies involved with paper
documents.
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Rebilling Process

• The Impact
• Costs incurred from paper-based process
• Productivity losses in AP and the field
• Document transportation to / from HQ and the
  field
• Filing, copying, touching the documents too
  many times
• Paper-document storage
• Revenue and Cash Impact
• Distracts Project Management from primary focus
  delivery and revenue generation
• Negatively Impacts Cash Flow increased amount of
  time for billings
• Creates Accounting Exposures inaccurate
  reporting
• Lost Revenue unrecoverable charges due to
  missing or lost backup
• Major source of client dissatisfaction

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The Billing Process in the 170 MarkView for
Project Re-Billing Solution

• Receipt and supplier invoice images are captured
  as part of the upfront, best-practice business
  processes driven by 170 MarkView in Oracle
  Payables (planning Oracle Internet Expenses at
  Mortenson)
• A user enters an Oracle Project-related invoice
  record with a 170 Systems workitem (image)
  attached to that invoice record
• When entering the AP invoice distributions
  (directly in Oracle or through the DFM), a
  descriptive flexfield is used to enter the pages
  of the invoice image that relate to the
  particular project distribution line
• If the flexfield is left blank, then the entire
  invoice image is assumed to relate to the
  distribution line
• Leveraged for Detail Billing
• Default 170 Systems configuration for Event
  Billing uses two date range DFFs (from date
  to date) on the Project event level

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Billing in the 170 MarkView for Project
Re-Billing Solution, cont.

• A concurrent program runs to create the draft
  invoice for the project in Oracle Projects
• The draft invoice backup document is compiled and
  attached to the draft invoice when the Oracle
  concurrent program run
• The draft invoice and backup can be reviewed by
  Project Administrators / Billers and Project
  Managers to clean it up prior to sending the
  image to a client (e.g., Black-out, White-out,
  Delete Page Markups)
• The draft invoice, once approved, is interfaced
  with AR via five Oracle request sets
• Once the AR invoice is created, the corresponding
  invoice backup is attached to the AR invoice in
  Oracle Receivables

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Billing in the 170 MarkView for Project
Re-Billing Solution, cont.

• The complete billing backup to the invoice is
  made available within Oracle Projects, Oracle
  Receivables and outside the ERP via 170 MarkView
  Web Inquiry for Projects
• Ultimately, billing backup is available in Oracle
  Receivables
• Some customers have deployed Oracles
  iReceivables web portals to deliver both their
  invoices as well as the associated billing backup
  electronically to their customers, without ever
  having to produce paper. 170 can also render the
  invoice itself to accompany the backup.

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Current Process Invoices Expense Receipts
Invoices
Invoice copied, filed in the field
Invoice entered and filed at AP if OK, otherwise
copied, filed and reworked
Vendor invoices received in field
Project distributions hand coded
Invoice manually approved
Invoice sent to AP
Inefficiencies Multiple touches to paper, many
copies, FedEx costs, lengthy cycle times
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Current Process Billing Back-Up
Project related invoices are located, copied,
re-filed
Documentation assembled, copies made for review,
sent to PM
Time Labor reports are located, copied and
re-filed
Draft invoice created
Manual review process, multiple iterations
required
Copies made for PM, AR and Customer
Project related expense receipts are located,
copied, re-filed
Inefficiencies Many people involved, redundant
process caused by separation of ERP and the
documents
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Customer Satisfaction

• Most customers want a more-streamlined billing
  vs. a book of receipts
• Being able to provide electronic receipts to
  customers is beneficial.
• 170 Systems is a critical part of being able to
  provide full self-service for non-Mortenson
  customers and sub-contractors

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Rebilling Process The Business Solution

• With an integrated solution, you can
• Reduce the cost, time, and effort associated with
  paper-based processes such as manually gathering
  and creating billing backup
• Reduce the DSO and increase revenue captured for
  project-related expenses
• Keep Project Managers and their teams focused on
  revenue generating activities
• Preempt billing disputes by providing clients
  with complete backup information for all billing
  line items
• Eliminate billing errors and unrecoverable
  charges
• Strengthen internal controls for expense
  re-billing, while reducing audit costs

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Future State Invoice Processing
EDIXMLPaperFaxImages
Header Information
Sort/Scan
Project Code
Final AP Review
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Future State Time Reporting
Projects
Oracle Approval Coding
Fax Back up
Automatic Association with Report
Time Report Detail
Print Bar Coded Cover Sheet
Enter Timesheet Detail
Submit Timesheet Detail
Auto Create Virtual Timesheet
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Expenditure-to-Cash Process Solution

• Integrate all of the off-line information with
  the ERP transactions as part of the up-front
  business process and eliminate the paper
• Automate transaction processing steps through 170
  MarkView Financial Suite workflows to streamline
  the AP, Employee Expenses, and TL processes
• Generate all backup documentation associated with
  a Customer Invoice on-line automatically

Time Reporting
Back-Up Documentation
Expense Receipts
Vendor Invoices
Projects
Customer Invoice
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M. A. Mortenson The Challenges

• Customer invoice creation was still extremely
  manual, time-consuming, and inefficient
• Project leads and billing staff had to maintain
  duplicate copies of all expenditure and time
  sheet information
• Bills to be submitted to customers required
  extensive resources to compile all sub-contractor
  and related billings
• Supplier invoices were often lost, routed in an
  expensive and time consuming fashion, and hard
  and expensive to retrieve

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M. A. Mortenson Leveraging Oracle 11i
Time Reports
Internet Time / OTL
Employee Expenses
Vendor Invoices
Customer Invoices
Project Expenditures
AR
Invoice in AP
Payables
Projects
Oracle Internet Expenses planned
Customers
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M. A. Mortenson Leveraging 170 Systems Billing
Backup Upfront On-line
170 MarkView Functionality/Integration noted in
blue text
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Lessons Learned

• Did wells
• Allowed more time for integration with On Demand
• Used remote connectivity vs. consultants on-site
• Do betters
• Better testing of invoice scanning
• Need to test all types of invoices, not just most
• Need full DBA support
• Train the Trainer closer to Go Live
• Better end-user training pre-Go Live

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Demonstration
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Questions?

• Rick Lackner
• Email rick.lackner_at_mortenson.com
• Phone [phone]
• Web www.mortenson.com
• For more information on 170 Systems, Inc.
• www.170systems.com