Macro 4 system delivers cost savings, boosts service

The UK`s second largest home shopping business and fourth largest high street retailer, Littlewoods Retail, has introduced a new Web-based self-service system that will allow its 2 000 suppliers to access a wide range of financial documents online, improving supplier relationships and enabling them to resolve financial queries faster.

The implementation by global software company, Macro 4 plc, has increased productivity and reduced costs within Littlewoods Retail`s finance department, while improving communication to supply chain partners.

Historically, Littlewoods had used Macro 4`s Columbus product suite to archive financial data for internal use only. By extending this capability, Macro 4, working in partnership with Littlewoods Retail, was able to address all the requirements by implementing a Web-based supplier self-service solution. Now suppliers can access their entire financial document history with Littlewoods online and, as a result, will be able to resolve many of their queries by themselves.

Instead of sending financial documents to suppliers by traditional post, Littlewoods is now able to send e-mail notifications as soon as new documents are available, thereby eliminating the time lag caused by traditional post. Suppliers then log onto the Littlewoods supplier Web site, where they can access all financial documents that relate to them. Using Columbus, Littlewoods staff can pre-empt supplier queries by attaching explanatory notes and comments to specific documents.

"As part of our group-wide efficiency initiatives, we have a continuous improvement programme exploiting new technology to reduce transaction processing costs while improving the level of service we provide," said Geoff Maitland, Director of Accounting, Littlewoods Retail Ltd. "We have initiated several self-service projects to enable us to introduce electronic workflow processes and realise productivity improvements within our finance function."

Littlewoods operates a self-billing agreement with it suppliers. As a result, one significant obstacle the project had to overcome was the legal requirement on Littlewoods to provide evidence to Customs and Excise that tax invoices had been received and read by its suppliers. To address this, Macro 4 recommended using PDF renditions of the original documents, which cannot be edited. Also, when suppliers log onto the Littlewoods Web site, their actions are tracked to ensure that there is an auditable trail of documents accessed and viewed, fulfilling the requirements of Customs and Excise.

Ray Donson, Accounting Development Manager, Littlewoods Retail, commented: "The need to comply with the legal requirements on Littlewoods was a key consideration for us. Without the ability to satisfy Customs and Excise, we would not have been able to introduce this Web-based service."

From the outset, Littlewoods was looking at a range of finance-led initiatives that would provide a tangible return on investment. The Columbus solution from Macro 4 working closely with the Littlewoods finance systems team not only met this requirement, but also delivered additional benefits in process efficiencies and service improvements for all suppliers.