DIGITISATION
When the printer stops printing invoices
ISSUE 12 | DECEMBER 2021, ZEITUNG FÜR KOMMUNALE WIRTSCHAFT, Frank Zscheile, IT journalist, Munich, mailcenter-plattform-dvv-digitalisierung-zfk-122021.pdf Duisburg – Duisburger Versorgungs- und Verkehrsgesellschaft (DVV) is a multi-service group for supply, mobility and services. With around 4350 employees, the Group has more than 30 companies. The central accounting system in which outgoing invoices are created is SAP. Especially at the beginning of the month, thousands of invoices are issued per day – a high burden on the printing lines. So the desire arose to be able to send invoices by e-mail. Many customers are now also pushing for invoices to be sent to them only electronically as PDF. This in turn enables them to process internally more quickly.
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New digitization platform makes work easier
Wolfgang Scheffler, SAP Senior Consultant Logistics/Accounting at DVV: “In principle, we were concerned with two topics: electronic invoicing as such and the legal obligation to e-invoicing, i.e. the creation of the new e-invoice formats X-invoice and Zugferd, which will apply in the future in accordance with EU Directive 204/55/EU.” DVV has been organizing both since 2020 with a new digitization platform, the “MailCenter” from the Munich-based manufacturer Munich Enterprise Software, which is directly integrated into SAP. This allows business documents to be sent by e-mail from SAP, invoices as well as purchasing-related documents. In the software, you can carry out a dedicated message finding, i.e. select which format type is to be generated and to which group company the invoice is to be assigned. In addition, all invoices initially converge in a document pool of the digitization platform. There, colleagues from the Group Invoicing/Central Invoicing Department can check again whether all the necessary attachments are attached to the invoice. 
Process optimization through digitization
For the management, the focus is on using such a system to advance digitization in the company. This works all the better the more integrated and less disruptive digital business processes are. By using the new platform, DVV also saves high manual effort, time and thus costs; it also meets all legal requirements for sending e-invoices. Not all customers are even able to receive e-mail invoices. Private customers, for example, who apply for a new grid connection and only appear once as a customer at all. However, where DVV has already switched almost completely to shipping via the new software are the many intra-group invoices. These arise when companies exchange services with each other. The platform is now to be extended to other areas, including purchasing. There, too, it is helpful if you can attach attachments to an order or request and submit both together. Here again, an almost equally high annual document quantity as with the invoices is waiting.
