Contributed by: Kelli Chandler, Director of Finance, Flood Protection Authority

With 265 employees across four physical locations, the Flood Protection Authority (FPA) is responsible for overseeing the flood defense system in metropolitan New Orleans, LA. FPA worked with their solution provider SYGNVS to automate the invoice approval process with Laserfiche Forms, cutting invoice processing time by more than half from 30-45 days to 10-15 days.

When the FPA starts a new project, the finance director creates a project folder in the Abila MIP accounting software and specifies how the project invoices will need to be coded. The director assigns the project to a specific vendor. Each vendor is identified by a unique vendor number.

Vendors submit any invoices that need to be paid through a dedicated vendor portal on the authority’s website.

When the vendor clicks the Submit Invoice button on the website, a vendor invoice upload form loads. This form is created in Laserfiche Forms. The vendor types in the vendor number and is presented with a list of assigned projects. This is accomplished through a lookup into Abila MIP. The vendor selects the appropriate project, enters the invoice information and uploads the actual invoice. The form automatically calculates the balance that needs to be paid based on the project information.

After the form is submitted, it is assigned to the project manager for review. The project manager looks at the pending balance and compares it to the balance on the invoice. She or he also verifies that the coding was done properly in Abila MIP, and the work has been completed.

The invoices and associated documentation are saved in the repository, in a folder by fiscal year and vendor.

Each invoice has appropriate metadata assigned, including the name, vendor number, date, invoice number and invoice amount.

Once a week ,  Accounts Payable exports the metadata information for the approved invoices from Laserfiche into a spreadsheet and uploads it into Abila MIP.

In the first four months after launching this project, 2,000 invoices have been received through this new process. Invoice processing time has been cut by more than half. It used to take 30-45 days to process an invoice and now takes 10-15 days.