Leicester NHS Turns To Cloud For Help Processing Invoices

The University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust has turned towards the cloud to help its service improvement and efficiency drive.

With the help of software provider Advanced Business Solutions, the Trust has implemented Cloud Invoicing to aid the processing of 50,000 invoices a year issues by 150 suppliers.

Leicester hopes that this contract will allow it to save around 140 man hours per month, allow staff to spend time on other key areas of work in the Accounts Payable team.

Advanced claims that the Trust is the first to implements its new Cloud Invoicing solution ahead of new European and government directives coming into force in 2015 that will make it compulsory for all organisations to offer e-invoicing to suppliers as part of e-procurement measures to drive down costs.

Cloud Invoicing is integrated will the firm’s eFinancials product, a financial management system it claims is in use by over 80 NHS organisations.

Advanced says suppliers use Cloud Invoicing to post online invoices and all information is then automatically imported into eFinancials for approval by the relevant staff.

Time, Money And The Environment Saved

It claims e-invoicing eliminates the need for documents to be printed and scanned, which not only saves time and money, but also represents a greener option.

“Our 30 day payment terms are based on the date the invoice is received, not when it was issued by the supplier,” claimed Mick Cook, finance systems manager at the Leicester Trust.

“So if an invoice is posted to us, this will naturally have an impact on when the supplier is subsequently paid.

“Invoices sent to us via the cloud are received and uploaded into our purchase ledger on the same day, so the supplier can be paid on a timelier basis and the Trust can potentially benefit from early payment discounts.

“It’s still early days by we are encouraged by what we have seen so far,” he added.

© 24N.biz