Oracle Cloud Financials Invoice Imaging Release 12 Implementation | Lessons Learned

Oracle Cloud ERP Financials Invoice Imaging has provided a user-friendly framework and it offers excellent features for improving the productivity of the Finance department. Centroid has recently implemented Cloud Invoice Imaging for AP for a client in less than a month.

We would like to share some of the lessons learned during the implementation.

Overview

In Cloud Financials R12, Oracle invoices images can be sent by suppliers and they will be processed as Invoice image and imported into Payables as Invoices. These invoices would be created with Incomplete status and reviewed by users with Accounts Payable specialist or Accounts Payable Supervisor Job roles. Upon review and validation, invoices can be processed. The invoice image sent by the supplier will be part of the invoice as an attachment.

This saves manual data entry and paper storage of manual invoices. With few keystrokes, AP invoice processing can be automated.

The reconciling of Invoice processing sent by suppliers with the system can be performed by Image Auditability report.

Key Setups

1. Image Viewer Profile Option: Create new profile option using Manage Profile Options. Create the Profile option with the name AP_IMAGING_BASIC_VIEWER 

Enable and Updatable at User and Product level:

Navigate to Manage Administrator Profile Values to add value for the new profile option :

Select Site Level and put Value as “Y”, click Save and Close :

2. Inbox: The Inbox to receive Invoices would be set up by Oracle. A SR needs to be created to fetch the email address to be provided to the suppliers

Example: [email protected]

Only after Oracle confirms that Inbox is setup and running the SR needs to be closed.

3. PO Recognition: For PO matched invoices formats must be defined. This format helps in PO numbering recognition and based on the client requirements. Key guidelines to be noted are that reserved words PO and NO should not be used in PO Numbering scheme. Oracle recommends using PO numbers as Alphanumeric

Examples: In our business requirements, Some PO’s were externally interfaced from the 3^rdparty system and some were manually created. So, 2 formats were created.

PON_VL_01_Format=XXX#######
PON_VL_01_Ignore=.,-/_
PON_VL_02_Format=#####
PON_VL_02_Ignore=-/_

4. Suppliers: Suppliers address must be defined in the system accurately. A Supplier Pay site must be defined. Internal Suppliers should use a Supplier Type of Internal or Employees and should not share same supplier type of External vendors. If a new supplier is defined it usually takes 24 hours to make them eligible for invoice process. A supplier Synchronization process happens behind the scene.
5. Users: Each User processing the invoice needs to be assigned a Business Defaulting Unit
6. Invoice template:  The Address format must preferably define Supplier address on Top left-hand side or Bottom. The Bill To address should be on the right-hand side.
7. Approval Rule: FinApIncompleteInvoiceHold task includes a rule set called IncompleteInvoiceRuleSet. This rule set includes a rule called JobRoleAssignmentRule. This rule is preconfigured to route incomplete invoices to users with the Accounts Payable Specialist and Accounts Payable Supervisor job roles. This can be changed as per business requirements
8. Schedule Import Payables Invoice ESS job to run with a frequency as per business requirements. We have setup it to run for every 1 hour. The invoice source is Imaging. Example is provided below. Purge Yes or No determines whether record is purged in the interface table

9. Setup Imaging Auditability feature to generate the report. That setup is outside the scope of this whitepaper.

Processing of Invoice Image by Suppliers

1. Supplier sends the Invoice to the email address provided by business. The invoice template should adhere to the standards specified in section F) above. It can be word or pdf. 300 dpi is recommended. The Subject should indicate the Business Unit or intelligence can be built for routing the invoice
2. After the invoice is sent it takes minimum 20 minutes to appear in the image section
3. The Image section needs to be accessed by a specific URL
   https://XXXX-test.fs.<POD>.oraclecloud.com/imaging/faces/Pages/Welcome.jspx

4. Validate that image is matching the email template. The image is not editable.
5. Schedule Import Payables Invoice ESS job as per step H) above
6. The Invoice is processed and created in the System
7. The image is attached to the invoice in the system

Image Auditability

Oracle Cloud provides a seeded functionality to business users to reconcile the images processed and status tracking.

The Report output is displayed below :

Notes

1. There are many scenarios for AP invoice creation and Templates vary by Suppliers. Hence testing the scenarios is important
2. The project planning and number of supplier templates determines the testing cycle
3. Suppliers should be notified about imaging requirements.
4. The business needs to be trained to handle exceptions
5. AP invoice processing team needs to check the images for handling discrepancy

Customer Experience

• R12 AP Invoice Imaging architecture uses OCR and UCM solution with an easy to navigate UI.
• The ESS jobs must be scheduled in the background to avoid any user intervention.
• Assistance needs to be provided to the users regarding invoice exception.
• Imaging Auditability reports need to be run for reconciliation purposes.
• The implementation needs to be done on STAGE and then move to PROD

Still have questions? Contact Centroid to learn more about Oracle Cloud Financial Invoice Imaging and how Centroid can help.