Bulmers Ltd. achieves AP Automation with SoftCo R8

Dublin, Ireland. SoftCo, a global supplier of document management and business process automation solutions, is pleased to announce that Bulmers Limited has chosen SoftCo to deliver an Accounts Payable automation solution to handle its growing volume of global supplier invoices. Bulmers Limited is part of the global C&C Group, producing some of the most famous cider and lager brands in the world.

Bulmers had an urgent requirement to implement a workflow and document management solution to streamline the process of approval and payment for almost 40,000 supplier invoices annually. Bulmers chose SoftCo to deliver a solution to address the challenges within its AP processes, to create greater efficiencies and to cut costs. After a close engagement that involved working closely with key Bulmers stakeholders, SoftCo designed a customised solution to optimise the invoice approval process end-to-end:

• Bulmers AP staff now use SoftCo R8, a compliant process automation and document management platform, to capture all supplier invoices.
• Automatic three-way matching means a significant volume of invoices are queued automatically for payment.
• 'Problem' invoices are escalated for action within the SoftCo AP process.
• Integrated workflow means that Bulmers AP staff receive email alerts and can address any issues via the SoftCo R8 system.
• Cleared invoices are queued in CODA Financials ERP for payment.
• All supplier invoices are archived in the compliant SoftCo R8 platform.

"The feedback from staff has been very positive. Problem invoices are actioned much more quickly than when we operated a manual approval system. And because staff act faster, we can pay suppliers faster and have better relationships with them," said Elaine O'Connell, AP Manager for Bulmers Limited.

To view the full Case Study click here

About Bulmers Limited
Bulmers Limited of Clonmel, a company within the C&C Group, owns the trade mark BULMERS® in the Republic of Ireland. Bulmers Ltd of Clonmel, Ireland, is not connected with HP Bulmer Ltd. of Hereford, UK. BULMERS ® Original Vintage Cider produced by Bulmers Ltd. of Clonmel, Ireland, is sold outside the Republic of Ireland under the name MAGNERS® Original Irish Cider.

For more information please visit www.bulmers.ie

Dublin Bus and C&C Group keynote speakers at SoftCo AP Lunch Briefings

Dublin, Ireland. SoftCo, leaders in Business Process Automation and Document Management Solutions, are pleased to announce a series of Accounts Payable Lunch Briefings during the month of March with keynote speakers Dublin Bus and C&C Group. The Lunch Briefings will take place on Tuesday, 6th March in The Convention Centre, Dublin and in The Clarion Hotel, Cork on Friday, 9th March. Aimed at Senior Financial & Business Professionals, the briefings will demonstrate how SoftCo AP reduces the costs of handling supplier invoices and ensures full control and visibility of each invoice throughout the entire payment and approval cycle.

Carrying over 118 million customers a year, Dublin Bus had inherent challenges with the manual processing of paper invoices. At the Dublin Briefing, Gerry Sullivan from Dublin Bus will describe how their Finance Team addressed their AP challenges and can now resolve supplier queries in a matter of minutes with complete control and transparency over their entire AP process. Gerry will also discuss how integration with SAP provides direct access to invoices and associated documents from within their ERP system.

Based in Clonmel, C&C Group plc is a global manufacturer and distributor of branded long alcoholic drinks, including the internationally-marketed Magners cider brand. In 2011 C&C Group went to market to find an answer to the increasing challenges faced by its Accounts Payable function. At the Cork briefing, Elaine O'Connell, AP Manager with C&C Group, will demonstrate how the implementation of SoftCo AP in their organisation has cut their costs, increased their accuracy and reduced processing times of supplier invoices.
SoftCo consultants will demonstrate the ROI that can be achieved by organisations of all sizes by implementing an automated AP solution and outline the additional savings that can be achieved by hosting the entire AP process within the SoftCo Cloud infrastructure.

Event Registration
The event is focused at Senior Financial & Business Professionals and is free for registered attendees. To register your interest in attending please click here. Alternatively, contact Paul Tighe on (+353) 1 2942420 or email paul.tighe@softco.com

SoftCo Cloud meets the brief for Kingsbourne (Pty) Ltd

Johannesburg, South Africa. SoftCo, global supplier of document management and business process automation solutions are delighted to announce that Kingsbourne  (Pty) Ltd. have chosen SoftCo Cloud to streamline their case management processes and to provide a company-wide document management solution. Headquartered in Johannesburg, Kingsbourne are one of South Africa’s leading Legal firms specialising in the Construction and Engineering Industry.

For over 20 years Kingsbourne (Pty) has worked with many of South Africa’s leading construction and engineering firms in all aspects of construction law, claims and dispute resolution, including adjudication, mediation and arbitration. The nature of their work means handling large volumes of documents, across multiple formats – from CAD drawings to emails – while collaborating with clients at a variety of levels. Prior to SoftCo, Kingsbourne relied on a manual, paper-based process which made case management both time consuming and inefficient.

Kingsbourne chose SoftCo Cloud, powered by SoftCo R8, as their preferred document management solution. The SoftCo Cloud solution provides Kingsbournes consultants with secure access to all their associated case files via a secure web browser, regardless of their location. This has not only improved Kingsbourne’s internal and external processes but has also resulted in improved customer service, collaboration and reduced costs. It is estimated that the SoftCo Cloud solution will save Kingsbourne hundreds of hours per month in helping them manage construction projects more effectively. Kingsbourne also has the ability to extend their case management system to their Clients to further improve collaboration and customer service in the future.

“Our aim is to resolve disputes and problems by working with clients as part of a team and helping them manage construction disputes more effectively. The SoftCo Cloud Solution has already helped us with achieving this goal by facilitating better information management and saving us hundreds of hours searching for documents” commented Warren van der Vyver, Director, Kingsbourne (Pty) ltd.

About Kingsbourne (Pty) Ltd.
Kingsbourne (Pty) Ltd is a multi-disciplinary company of lawyers, quantity surveyors, engineers, construction managers and planners, who provide a specialised service to the construction and engineering industry from offices located in Johannesburg, South Africa.
For more information please visit www.kingsbourne.co.za

Considerations for Improving Insurance Claim Processes in Irish Hospitals (E-Claims)

Irish hospitals know all too well that inefficiencies in the patient claims submission process can have a severe effect on the financial health of the organisation. In Ireland today, the pressure has never been greater on healthcare providers to find practical solutions that will help minimise pended and rejected insurance claims and accelerate payments from healthcare insurers.

The concept of submitting insurance claims electronically to insurers is drawing increasing attention among Irish healthcare providers. What will adopting an electronic claims (E-Claims) strategy mean for hospital personnel, and for the investment in existing hospital information systems? There are three major areas of concern that come into focus for Irish hospitals now examining their options for migrating to an E-Claims strategy:

• Collating electronic and paper documentation: although the ideal situation would be for all documentation relating to a patient's care to be electronic, the reality is that in Ireland paper still proliferates in connection with every patient case. The most suitable E-Claims solution is one that can build up a single secure repository of all patient information, regardless of the information's original format.

• Integration with existing hospital systems, not replication: PAS, HIMS, billing systems and other databases already in use by hospitals should ideally interface directly with any E-Claims technology adopted. Unfortunately many solutions require that Hospitals replicate their core data into a standalone E-Claims system, which leads to a fundamental loss of control and visibility within the Hospitals core systems. Hospitals should ensure that their HIS systems remains the authoritative source of all patient information.

• Validating claims before submission to insurers: An efficient E-Claims solution should enable hospitals to automatically check the validity of claims before submission to the insurer using an intelligent rules engine. By doing so there is an ability to ensure that submitted claims are accurate every time, reducing the number of pended / rejected claims which significantly reduces debtor days and improves hospital cash flow.

Validation is typically achieved by automatically matching the data drawn from collated patient documentation against an intelligent rules engine. This process will detect and alert the hospital to potential problems so these can be resolved before submission – for example, if a patient was hospitalised for seven days in a case where the surgical procedure in question only qualifies for reimbursement for five days.
It is clear that improving health insurance claims processes is now a defined priority across the entire Irish healthcare sector. However, the path to achieving these improvements is less so for many Irish Hospitals. It is SoftCo's firm belief that a a phased approach towards implementing an E-Claims strategy is the most realistic and effective way forward. While other vendors promote a process that requires a root-and-branch business process reengineering program across all hospital departments, the reality is that a phased approach can deliver exponential benefits while maintaining continuity and control within the hospital. And as the healthcare and insurance sectors continue to evolve – including insurers' own development of the data sets they will require as E-Claims becomes the industry standard – it will be critical that solutions chosen today will also cater for the decisions made tomorrow.

SoftCo is an experienced provider of solutions that deliver business process improvements to the healthcare industry. Leading healthcare organizations that have implemented SoftCo’s technology include UPMC Beacon, Iowa Heath System, NHS and the Mater Private Hospital.

To learn more about SoftCo’s Healthcare Solutions please click here.

If you would like to speak to a SoftCo Healthcare Specialist please click here.

Explosion in corporate email traffic drives compliance

Dublin, Ireland. With the volume of corporate emails continuing to soar globally, organisations need to re-think their strategies around data retention and compliance. According to recent research by the Radicati Group on global email usage, the average business user sends/receives of 105 emails per day. This results in approximately 41Bn emails being generated in each 24 hour period, with this figure set to grow by 20% by 2015. From a corporate perspective the management of such large volumes of data not only impacts on the storage infrastructure of an organisation but also causes considerable headaches around compliance.

The effect of compliance on corporate email policies is now far-reaching. Global regulations such as Sarbanes-Oxley, FINRA and HIPAA, drive the need for specific email management criteria. These include a requirement to ensure the authenticity of all stored email data, define specific retention periods and to guarantee the availability of emails at all times. However, arguably the most significant impact of compliance is on the shift of ownership/responsibility for the management of emails within organisations – moving from the sole ownership of IT Departments to a company-wide responsibility that includes employees, management and directors.

With such drivers it is essential that organisations embrace robust and scalable email management technologies. The limitations of traditional email mailbox backups often fall short of what is required from both a compliance and operational perspective. Organisations are now embracing email lifecycle management solutions that not only provide the ability to archive a ‘True record’ of every email that passes through an organisation, but also provides efficient “search and retrieval” functionality that ensure emails can be managed proactively within the business. For forward thinking organisations, such proactivity extends to using inbound email to trigger workflows that automate business processes and enhance the functionality of ERP/CRM/Finance systems.
SoftCo eMail collector provides organisations with such functionality and benefits.

Powered by SoftCo R8, eMail collector enables businesses to successfully implement and manage compliant email policies, in addition to reducing costs and improving process efficiencies. Regardless of sector, country or organisation size, SoftCo eMail collector is the answer to your corporate email headaches.

About SoftCo eMail Collector
SoftCo eMail Collector captures and securely archives every email that passes through an organisation’s mail server. Authorised personnel can access a wide and powerful range of “search and retrieve” options so that all documents required can be produced within seconds. Full-text indexing allows administrators to search both emails and attachments using a number of different criteria including email body, subject line and recipient.
Email Collector integrates seamlessly with existing mail systems. The compliance component ensures the authenticity of every email, Single Instance Storage removes duplication and full Life Cycle Management allows organisations to set defined retention rules and meet compliance obligations.

To learn more about eMail Collector click here.

SoftCo Cloud delivers efficiency boost to Resolution Underwriters

Johannesburg, South Africa. SoftCo, global supplier of document management and business process automation solutions are delighted to announce that Resolution Underwriters (Pty) Ltd. have chosen SoftCo Cloud to streamline their underwriting and claims departments. Headquartered in Johannesburg, Resolution Underwriters are one of South Africa’s leading Health Insurance Providers.

Insurance companies traditionally rely on both labour and document intensive processes to run their day-to-day business. Resolution Underwriters is no different, having to deal with significant volumes of contracts, policies, applications and claims forms in a variety of different formats. These documents originate from multiple sources, including email submissions, faxes and paper-based documents received by post. Managing the capture and distribution of this information in a timely and efficient manner presented a significant challenge to Resolution Underwriters.

Resolution Underwriters chose SoftCo Cloud, powered by SoftCo R8, as their preferred on-demand document management solution in order to deliver the required efficiencies throughout their business. Their preference was for a cloud based solution that could securely manage the full lifecycle of their insurance claim documentation and deliver significant process improvements. SoftCo Cloud gives Resolution Underwriters staff the ability to improve customer service, to work more collaboratively and to create a framework for future compliance requirements.

“We are delighted to have chosen SoftCo Cloud as our document management solution. We have built a process around it that will improve our operational efficiencies, the accuracy of stored data, create faster claim retrievals and generate an overall improvement in our ability to handle the many requests we receive each day from both clients and brokers” commented Minet Roberts-Meyer, GM of Resolution Underwriters. 

About Resolution Underwriters
Resolution Underwriters (Pty) Ltd (FSP: 4710) is a registered financial services provider, dedicated to providing the best insurance. Their philosophy of continuous improvement means that the client is always guaranteed individual attention and superior products which will meet their needs and exceed their expectations.

To learn more about Resolution Underwriters please click here
 
To learn more about SoftCo Cloud click here

SoftCo to host 'Cloud Technologies' Briefing in Johannesburg, South Africa

Johannesburg, South Africa. SoftCo, leaders in Business Process Automation and Document Management Solutions, are hosting a breakfast briefing 'Cloud Technologies: Delivering Efficiencies & Reducing Costs' in association with its local partners Allscan and Dynamic IT. The briefing will take place in Johannesburg on Thursday 24th November, 2011.

The informative briefing will showcase how Cloud based applications are delivering processes improvements and significant cost savings to organisations across all sectors. Cloud based applications have opened up new deployment opportunities for organisations in delivering their IT projects, with the potential to eliminate the significant infrastructure and maintenance costs associated with on-premise solutions. SoftCo will share its experience of how its solutions are being deployed within the Cloud to its global customer base.

Key Topics Covered: Cloud Infrastructure & Applications 
Document Management
Introduction to the SoftCo Cloud Document & Workflow Management environment. Demonstration of key modules including cloud based capture, workflow routing, retrieval and fully compliant archival. 

Accounts Payable Workflow in the Cloud
SoftCo Accounts Payable (AP) streamlines the entire AP process, reducing operational costs and providing real time financial visibility. With over 300,000 users globally, SoftCo AP is a proven solution both on-premise or on-demand. 

Email Collector
SoftCo Email Collector provides secure storage, rapid retrieval and full SoftCo Email Collector provides secure storage, rapid retrieval and full Life Cycle Management of all company emails to meet international compliance and HR management obligations. 

Electronic Invoicing
E-Invoicing delivers electronic generation of customer invoices, automated delivery and a full query management portal. The benefits include a 50% reduction in manual direct invoicing costs such as printing and postage.

The event is focused at business managers and IT professionals. Pre-registration is required. To register your interest in attending please click here or contact Kevin Parker on (+27) 11 886 0212 / kevin.parker@softco.com

PIC South Africa roll out SoftCo R8

Johannesburg, South Africa. SoftCo, global supplier of document-management and Cloud solutions, headquartered in Ireland, are delighted to announce that Public Investment Corporation (PIC) has expanded its use of SoftCo’s solutions with the deployment of SoftCo R8 throughout the organisation.

Pictured from L to R: Elias Masilela, Chief Executive Officer, PIC, Susan Spence, Group Director, SoftCo, Jan O'Sullivan TD, Irish Minister of State with responsibility for Trade & Development, Kevin Parker, Sales Manager, SoftCo South Africa.

PIC manages assets valued at R1.032 trillion, making it one of the largest investment managers on the African continent. PIC is wholly owned by the South African government and was established in 1911. R8 is implemented throughout PIC delivering world class document management and fast WORM (write once read many) magnetic storage ensuring PIC meet strict compliance obligations. The system manages the key investment documentation, is also deployed in a number of other business functions including Human Resources and incorporates a full Disaster Recovery infrastructure.

The news was announced by Jan O’Sullivan, TD, Irish Minister of State, Department of Foreign Affairs & Trade at a reception held on 8 November in Johannesburg. The event was hosted by Enterprise Ireland, the Irish Government Agency responsible for driving leadership and growth for innovative Irish companies in international markets.

“South Africa is a growth market for our products,” said Susan Spence, co-founder of SoftCo who attended the event. “We recently established an office in Johannesburg to build on a number of customer successes. PIC is an important part of that growth and we are delighted to be associated with such a successful organisation which celebrates its centenary this year.”

About Public Investment Corporation
Public Investment Corporation Limited (PIC) manages assets valued at R1.032 trillion as at 31 March 2011, making it one of the largest investment managers on the African continent. Their clients are public sector entities, most of which are pension, provident, social security, development and guardian funds. PIC’s role is to invest funds on behalf of these clients, based on investment mandates set by each client and approved by the Financial Services Board (FSB), with which they are registered as a financial services provider.

SoftCo Host Successful Electronic Invoicing Event in the CCD

Dublin, Ireland. SoftCo, leading providers of business process automation and document management solutions, hosted the first SoftCo Electronic Invoicing Breakfast Briefing at the Convention Centre in Dublin. The event was a great success with a very strong attendance by both prospective and existing SoftCo customers, all of whom were keen to learn more about SoftCo’s Electronic Invoicing solution. Their main driver was to learn about how SoftCo Electronic Invoicing can reduce the high costs and inefficiencies from their traditional paper-based invoicing processes.

The briefing was attended by Senior IT and Financial managers from some of Ireland’s largest companies and public sector organisations. The guest speaker for the event was Vincent McCullagh from Deloitte who presented the legal background to Electronic Invoicing within the EU. Our own Killian McCarthy and Garret Pearse then expertly demonstrated the SoftCo Electronic Invoicing solution, outlining its benefits for prospective customers and showing the clear return on investment proposition that it delivers to our customers.

If you are interested in attending future SoftCo events please contact Paul Tighe on (01) 2942420 or paul.tighe@softco.com. Alternatively you can keep track of our latest events on our website.

SoftCo E-Procurement: Making Procurement Pay

An inefficient procurement process can have far reaching effects across an organisation. Poor purchasing controls result in ad-hoc or maverick buying, excessive supplier costs and increased risk of fraud. Manual and paper based requisitions create approval delays, significant administration costs and poor visibility of the organisation’s true spending commitments.

SoftCo E-Procurement is a fully integrated solution that enables organisations to streamline their end-to-end procurement process. Automating even the most complex of procurement procedures and providing real-time reporting of entire spend, SoftCo E-Procurement is a smarter, faster, and safer solution for managing an organisations purchasing needs.

Read more about the SoftCo E-Procurement Solution and Flash Demo.
Click here to download the SoftCo E-Procurement Datasheet