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Denbury Homes cuts AP administration by 20% with Access Coins and ancora
Established in 1986, Denbury Homes is a renowned homebuilder that has used Access Coins as its core ERP for over two decades.
Facing a growing volume of digital invoices and manual work for the AP team, Denbury Homes implemented ancora, an official technology partner of Access Coins, to automate invoice processing straight into its existing Access Coins cloud environment.
Business size
Medium
Industry
Homebuilding
Product
Access Coins
Challenge
- Business growth brought a significant increase in invoice volumes for the AP team
- A significant number of suppliers sent invoices in an unstructured format, outside the EDI process
- Manual invoice registration created bottlenecks at peak periods and when team members were on leave
Approach
- Denbury Homes chose ancora for its close integration with Access Coins, avoiding the cost of a bespoke integration
- Ancora captures invoice details using AI and machine learning, then uploads each invoice into Access Coins
Results
- AP staff each saving up to a day of admin time every week
- Manual invoice registration eliminated for the AP team
- Invoices flow into Access Coins regardless of holidays or staff rotations
Results At-A-Glance
- Up to a day saved every week: Within a few weeks of going live, AP staff were each saving up to a day of admin time every week.
- 10 to 20% time saving: John Painter, IT Manager, says each member of the AP team is seeing a 10 to 20% time saving in their workload.
- No more manual registration: Invoices now flow directly into Access Coins, eliminating manual invoice registration by the AP team.
- Unaffected by holidays: Invoices flow in regardless of holidays or staff rotations, which has also ended certain suppliers being tied to specific clerks.
- Higher accuracy: ancora recognises each supplier as unique and accommodates different invoice layouts, ensuring higher accuracy and reducing the need for manual intervention.
- Live in weeks: Denbury Homes implemented ancora in just a few weeks, with pre-live testing covering the various invoice types and submission methods it handles.
The Challenge: Manual Processes Places a Strain on a Growing Business
Denbury Homes wanted to head towards a position where they have 100% electronic automated invoice processing in operation in order to streamline their financial operations. Denbury Homes already utilised the Electronic Trading Community (ETC) functionality within Access Coins, which process invoice submissions by Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) for structured data.
However, the company also had a significant number of suppliers who were not using this method of payment request and were sending in invoices in an unstructured format. Recent years have seen a significant shift towards digital invoice submission, primarily via direct portal downloads and email attachments. While beneficial, this transition introduced new challenges for the AP team.
The process of transferring digital invoices into the company’s Access Coins ERP involved a considerable amount of manual downloading and uploading of files, with staff repeatedly ‘dragging and dropping’ between systems. The team also faced heightened cyber security concerns due to the potential manual opening and transferring of documents.
John Painter, IT Manager at Denbury Homes, who has been with the company for 25 years and was instrumental in the initial Access Coins deployment, observed the strain. The existing processes, particularly the manual registration of invoices, consumed valuable time and created bottlenecks, especially during peak periods or when team members were on leave.
"We were finding that there was additional requirement for us to streamline the paperwork process. This coincided with the business having a significant increase in volume as the company grew. So, we were faced with the dilemma of either expanding the Accounts Payable function to encompass the growing volume of invoices and the extra processes or look for alternative ways to tackle the problem."
John Painter, IT Manager, Denbury Homes
The Solution: ancora's Intelligent Integration with Access Coins
Denbury Homes explored several applications to enhance their invoice processing. Their long-standing relationship with Access Coins led them to inquire about API access into the application. It was through this discussion that they learned of the Access Coins partnership with ancora, an intelligent invoice automation solution.
The decision to choose ancora was driven by its close integration capability with Access Coins. The robust security of the Access Coins application meant that any alternative solution would incur significant development costs for a bespoke integration. The ancora solution fitted perfectly into the gap as the solution was a partner technology and would mean that Denbury Homes did not need to bear any development costs themselves.
Denbury Homes implemented ancora rapidly in just a few weeks, focusing on automating invoice processing. They transitioned all non-EDI suppliers to submit invoices as PDF attachments by email, eliminating the need for their staff to carry out various portal downloads.
Initially, the AP team manually forwarded these emails to a specified ancora mailbox within their Microsoft 365 environment. After testing and assessing how the process was working, they implemented Exchange rules to automatically forward emails from certain senders and domains directly to the ancora mailbox, further streamlining the process. A key benefit of utilising two mailboxes (rather than just an ancora mailbox) was that this setup allowed the AP team to monitor incoming emails and identify any failed attachmentsor unprocessed invoices, giving them greater control and visibility.
When the email arrives in ancora’s mailbox, the solution automatically captures the invoice summary and line-item details from the invoices using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning. The invoice is then automatically uploaded into the Access Coins ERP platform and ancora appropriately costs the invoice for both PO and non-PO invoices, dependent upon the permissions that Denbury Homes had configured in their set-up.
“ancora’s intelligent recognition capabilities were a significant differentiator, unlike some of the other options we evaluated that had crude OCR solutions. These struggled with formatting changes or supplier variations but ancora uses basic intelligence to recognise each supplier as unique and accommodates different invoice layouts. This has ensured higher accuracy and reduced the need for manual intervention.”
John Painter, IT Manager, Denbury Homes
The implementation process itself was described by Denbury Homes as “very straightforward” and they benefited from the knowledgeable support from the ancora solution delivery team, who rapidly adapted the configuration to meet Denbury Homes' specific needs. The implementation phase also saw extensive and proactive pre-live testing, which covered the various invoice types and submission methods that Denbury Homes handles, which significantly reduced potential issues after the solution went live.
The Impact: Immediate Savings and Enhanced Efficiency
The adoption of ancora yielded tangible benefits for Denbury Homes within just a few weeks of going live - the intended outcomes of saving time and reducing invoice processing were realised, and AP staff were already each saving up to a day of admin time every week.
"Each member of the AP team is probably seeing a 10 to 20% time saving in their workload. The most significant impact has been the elimination of manual invoice registration by the AP team. Invoices now flow directly into the Access Coins ERP system, regardless of holidays or staff rotations, which has also eliminated the issue of certain suppliers being tied to specific clerks.”
John Painter, IT Manager, Denbury Homes
Denbury Homes currently use the ancora solution in their Accounts Payable function but have plans to expand its use to their Subcontractor Ledger, which would double the amount of their internal users. Denbury Homes is also collaborating with ancora and Access Coins on further development to enable three-way invoice matching within ancora to validate Goods Received Notes (GRNs), which would lead to even greater time savings for their AP team.
By integrating ancora’s intelligent OCR solution into their Access Coins ERP to deliver seamless, automated processing of unstructured invoices, Denbury Homes have benefited from:
- The ability to extract, validate, and synchronise invoice data directly into Access Coins
- Reduced manual entry workloads for their AP team
- Processing invoices in real-time with greater accuracy and fewer disputes
- Adding an efficient, automated solution to cover unstructured invoices through ancora alongside their existing Access Coins ETC solution for structured invoices, as they strive towards 100% electronic automated invoice processing.
Denbury Homes' experience with the ancora solution exemplifies how integrating intelligent automation with established ERP systems like Access Coins can deliver immediate, measurable benefits, which drive efficiency and support business growth without the need for increased headcount.
