TR Group automates invoice auditing to improve consistency in pricingTransport Industry
The variable costs of managing a truck and the focus on being cost efficient for the customers meant that the invoices must be consistent with the agreed pricing at all times.
This pricing consistency is hard to monitor given the scale of thousands of trucks across multiple customers, agreements and invoices. FOYI Consulting was involved to automate the invoice auditing.
Challenge
The senior leadership wanted to have an audit report that enables the pricing team to get a high level overview of any inconsistencies. Additionally, they also wanted the operational managers to get a view of the details around the inconsistencies for taking action.
During the initial discovery process, FOYI Consulting uncovered the following major challenges.
1. The IT systems were part of a massive IT transformation project.
The servers, databases and even the way to store the data was undergoing changes to ensure it is modern and efficient. However, this meant that any report based on the current systems will eventually need to be changed.
2. The IT department was growing rapidly.
The IT department was adding more talent to the team to support and leverage the the transformed systems. However, this meant that the current staff are fully occupied with the transformation on one hand and training new staff on the other.
3. The pricing and operations team were used to bespoke ways of auditing.
The operations team were used to manual auditing and were not fully aware of the latest reporting capabilities. The pricing team had their own unique way of working. Winning the confidence of the teams and building trust was a key to success of the project.
Approach
As part of the data discovery phase, FOYI Consulting worked with the IT department, pricing team and the operations management to identify tactical needs and strategic objectives. Based on this initial discovery phase, a 3 step approach was undertaken as follows.
Firstly, FOYI’s revenue leakage audit report was customised to audit the invoices. This built the trust of the business in the capability of modern reporting systems.
Secondly, the pricing team and the operations team were involved in further customising and refining the audit report to suit their requirements. This helped the pricing and operations team to discuss and streamline their bespoke ways of auditing.
Finally, the audit report after multiple iterations of refinement was handed over to the internal IT team to manage. This helped in ensuring the internal IT team had the time to focus on their transformation project while getting a done-for-you report.
Outcome
The 3 key outcomes and the benefits are as follows.
1. A daily audit of all invoices.
Benefit: Each invoice is compared with the recommended pricing on a daily basis. This meant that all the invoices are audited instead of just a sample.
2. Identified the key drivers of inconsistencies.
Benefit: Auditing invoices over a longer period brings out the patterns of inconsistencies. These patterns are used by businesses to take preventive measures.
3. Business adopted automated auditing.
Benefit: Building the trust of the business in the technology made it easier for the internal staff to work further on the changes without resistance to change.