Automated invoice creation using UiPath

Case study

Automated invoice creation
using UiPath

An industry stat shows that with high volume of invoices arriving in multiple formats, manual invoicing takes anywhere between 4.1 and 16.3 days to process, and consumes a large number of human resources. It involves performing repetitive tasks involving huge volumes of data from different sources. In this environment, the probability of errors, lost documents, and non-compliance is high.

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is the best fit for automating repetitive tasks. Automated invoice processing saves time and effort by creating higher efficiency and an increase in the accuracy of captured data. By reducing the manual effort, organizations can lower the cost and increase the revenue. The benefits of invoice automation continue to enhance productivity, cash flow, and stakeholder relations.

Client Introduction

Our client is a $6 billion global insurance brokerage and risk management firm. With offices in multiple locations, they specialize in delivering outstanding services to businesses, communities, and individuals who seek greater financial stability, and help them in sustainable growth.

Requirements

A centralized team was involved in manual processing of around 100,000 invoices a month using various tools and applications. To reduce manual errors and cut down the time taken for invoice processing, our client wanted to:

  • Automate the invoice creation process for the dispatched policies
  • Reduce Full Time Equivalents (FTEs) for resources to be efficiently utilized in process improvements, rather than task repetition

Challenges

  • Presence of duplicate and inconsistent data in the QA environment
  • Dependency on the performance of multiple applications, i.e., Agency Management System and Workflow System
  • Existence of either locked or password-protected screens

Solution

Imaginea came up with a solution to automate the invoice generation process in the client’s Agency Management System and integrate the same with the Workflow System.

An end to end RPA solution was engineered to run the billing process and generate invoices automatically, with minimal downtime. BOTs were used to automate standardized and repetitive data entry in processor functions of the Invoicing process flow.

Usage of easy to deploy reusable components within the solution ensured quick process implementation.

Tech stack

How our solution helped

Reduction in
the number of FTE

Accuracy in
invoice processing

Reduction in
handling time

Overall approach

After determining RPA as a good fit for the invoicing process, the steps to be automated were shortlisted. It was identified that the Agency Management System had many repetitive manual steps with higher possibility for automation. The process follows the steps to create transactions and generate invoices based on the details received from the Workflow System.

The automation steps were classified based on the below criteria and were prioritized to be handled in phases:

Input Attributes
  • Data - unstructured
  • Transaction volume - high
Task Complexity
  • Number of applications - low
  • Exceptions - low
Process Maturity
  • Task repetiviveness - high
  • Frequency of process change - low
  • Turn around time - low
Quality
  • Error rate - low
  • Priortzation - low

We decided to use reusable worklets for automation. These worklets are tiny independent testable workflows that can be easily integrated in any process. The worklets were used to replace manual intervention in the identified processor lines of the expense payments process flow.

Results

  • Reduction in the cycle time by 40% and improved efficiency
  • Reduction of manual effort and saving costs of FTEs by 90%
  • Improvisation in accuracy to 95% by eliminating human error
  • Instantiation of better human resources deployment

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