Seamless Integration with SAP Billing Data
Merger objectives of an energy provider are
met with powerful, WYSIWYG design tools and a
flexible interface for SAP RDI data files.
As a diversified energy company headquartered
in Ohio this electricity provider and its subsidiaries
and affiliates produce more than $12 billion
in annual revenue and own approximately $31 billion
in assets. They are involved in the generation,
transmission and distribution of electricity,
as well as energy management and other energy-related
services.
SAP Partner - Software
- with Certified Integration |
The seven electric utility operating companies
together comprise the nation’s fifth largest
investor-owned electric system. It serves 4.5
million customers in Ohio, Pennsylvania and New
Jersey producing over 76 billion kilowatt-hours
in 2005.
The Requirements
In conjunction with a merger in 2001 the use
of SAP R3 for business applications and the continued
use of the ISIS Papyrus Document System for billing
was decided for all operating companies. The
former company had originally selected Papyrus
in conjunction with their Y2K and SAP implementation
because ISIS demonstrated its ability to quickly
design and produce bills from SAP data. Papyrus
fulfilled this need for greater flexibility,
document quality and volume print processing
that SAP couldn’t offer alone.
Document processing requirements included:
• Dynamic Formatting including multiple
languages and charts (pie, bar)
• WYSIWYG design of billing and notice
applications including spell check
• Flexible print formatting including IPDS,
and AFP resource compatibility
• Handling of SAP RDI data (raw data interface)
• Integration with postal software processing
and barcode support
ISIS Papyrus demonstrated
its ability to quickly design and produce
bills from SAP data |
Decision Criteria for Papyrus
The Energy Corp. was able to quickly produce
bills and notices for all merged operating
companies based on prior experiences with the
rapid development capabilities of the Papyrus
Document System. Key Papyrus capabilities necessary
for merged, expanded processing were: variable
data, dynamic processing, flexible data handling
and visual designing with full previews of
all document pages
The Solution
The Energy Corporation’s Bill Print solution
uses Papyrus Designer and Papyrus
DocEXEC. Every night the company processes bills
using Papyrus for its seven operating companies
with volumes of 50,000 to 200,000 accounts. Additionally
collective/master/voucher processing of 10 to
100 bills varying from
5 to 200 pages is done. Other applications include
the printing of letters with volumes of 100 to
30,000 per cycle and check generation with volumes
of 25,000 a month.
Papyrus Designer’s
WYSIWYG design capabilities enable rapid
development and updating of new or changed
bill formats. |
Papyrus Designer’s WYSIWYG design capabilities
enable rapid development and updating of new
or changed bill formats. Features used include:
conditional processing to produce consolidated
billing for multiple services. And for the different
subsidiaries, data-driven power usage comparison
charts, conditional notices and marketing messages.
To start batch processing, SAP application servers
generate RDI or plain text and send the data
to its’ own unique, remote queue. Then
a series of UNIX scripts automate formatting
and printing.
• The first script checks for the number
of concurrent spool runs and launches the formatting
procedure.
• The second script invokes Papyrus DocEXEC
formatting for each spool request, creating an
index file and log file that is used for postal
processing to add the carrier’s route information.
• The third script checks that all post-processing
is completed, merges the updated log information
and runs the postal optimization routine to generate
the final print order to maximum postal discounts.
• Then this print order is sent to the
Papyrus DocEXEC postprocessing application which
imports the earlier pre-composed, indexed AFPDS
documents in the correct order, adds the additional
document information including carrier routing
and barcodes, and produces the final AFPDS.
• This final AFPDS is then processed by
the OCE print server and printed on the Pagestream
1000.
Benefits during the merger and initial implementation
• Support of Merger objectives (e.g. speed,
cost effectiveness, minimization of new investments,
maintaining customer satisfaction)
• Minimize investment in new solutions
for merged billing operations
• Productivity gains from the use of existing
skill-sets and experience with SAP and ISIS Papyrus
• Rapid Development of initial applications
as well as changes for merged operations
• Flexibility of Data Interfaces including
how efficiently Papyrus handles the SAP
RDI data files
• How easily and quickly developers can
make changes to applications
• Ease of integration with postal processing,
archiving software and other print management
applications
MOTIVATIONS for INNOVATION |
Motivation: |
Rapid development
and ease of handling SAP data and producing
high volume utility bills and notices
for multiple operating companies |
Innovation: |
Enhancing corporate identity and customer
communications along with maximizing postal
discount processing and multi-channel output
for integrating with other systems (EBPP,
EDI, EFT, ...) |
Solution: |
Papyrus Document Solution for designing
and formatting utility statements and notices |
PAPYRUS PRODUCTS
in use |
Papyrus
Designer on Windows |
WYSIWYG
dynamic document design |
Papyrus DocEXEC on HP-UX |
High speed document formatting
engine |
Papyrus Postprocessing/PrintPool
on HP-UX |
Bundling, sorting and reprinting
of bills |
Papyrus Server/PCL |
Distributed printing to PCL printers |
|
