Fortunately, the university’s research office had already been using the Oracle Projects module and More4apps Budget Wizard for Oracle EBS for many years albeit in a basic way.
The solution for Oracle EBS was to use a custom-designed simple Excel budget spreadsheet into which facilitators could enter their hours and travel costs, and which would be reformatted in the background and uploaded by the admin team using More4apps’ Budget Wizard. The Wizard, in turn, integrated directly with Oracle Projects to enable IPL to perform Time and Materials billing in a timely way, eliminating the need or manual processing. In addition, the More4apps tool allowed IPL management to see their facilitators’ bookings and commitments in a clear visual layout, allowing them to better allocate and manage human resources.
Now, invoices are generated automatically with all relevant contract details, saving administration time and ensuring that payments are received promptly. The ability to identify and invoice hundreds of thousands of dollars in travel disbursements automatically, with full audibility to actual cost transaction, ensures that all relevant disbursements are recovered appropriately. In addition, the Ministry of Education has multiple contract conditions related to the type and amount of travel allowed per contract, and Project Wizard’s configurations allows IPL to easily control these contract conditions.
The business has stabilized allowing IPL to grow and continue to take on new staff (4+ in the last quarter).
Revenue recognition and forecasting is now automated, simultaneously saving hours of time manipulating spreadsheets and improving accuracy.