E-procurement has so far mostly been with EDI. But there is also a need of a complement with e-invoices separately for all those situations that we dont order electronically but that it would be good having an e-invoice. A standard for an electronic invoice, “Svefakturan” (or “Swed Invoice”) has been developed and is recommended for public sector and their suppliers. The SwedInvoice can also be used B2B. Some local authorities have started to receive e-invoices and the Swed Invoice. But this is all very new.
The National Financial management Authority now procure IT-solutions for receiving and sending e-invoices and also workflow system. Many authorities, municipalities and county councils also have started with scanning of paper invoices.
How many municipalities have started with e-procurement?
According to a survey two years ago, 80 of 290 municipalities have introduced systems for electronic orders and/or receipt of electronic invoices. A further 50 municipalities are planning to introduce electronic procurement, of which 35 have already initiated a pilot study. Of the municipalities which have not introduced electronic procurement, the majority state that at present they do not have the staff or the financial resources to initiate the introduction of electronic procurement. However, over 70 municipalities can envisage introducing electronic procurement over the next few years. 57 municipalities scan paper invoices (of which some have scanning as a complement to electronic procurement).
Of the municipalities that have introduced electronic procurement, they have mainly started with food, office material, chemico-technical material and energy invoices, telephone invoices, rents, etc. Many municipalities have made assessments on the benefits obtained by electronic procurement. The majority of municipalities cite gains in the form of improved compliance with framework agreements and thus better prices and increased price awareness when the framework agreements and current prices are available electronically. Other effects are reduced invoice processing times, improved financial control and that purchasing can be more easily monitored when statistics are more easily available. The most difficult aspect of the introduction is to free resources, staff in the municipality for the introduction, including staff training.
Of the municipalities which have introduced electronic procurement, 95 per cent intend to expand this to other departments and/or categories of goods/services.
After this survey we have no new but we know that e-procurement is increasing and also e-invoicing and scanning. Among the municipalities that have made most progress is Eskilstuna (with 90 000 inhabitants) where 98 per cent of all food is ordered electronically. Another municipality is Skövde where 30% of all material is ordered electronically. Skövde municipality (with 50 000 inhabitants) has calculated the financial benefits and experienced, among other things, better compliance with framework agreements and thereby better prices. They have reduced the number of staff for invoice processing. The cost per portion for meals in housing for the elderly, school meals, etc. has been reduced due to the increased price awareness when food is ordered electronically. Overall, this means more resources for the core activity. The staff are positive to the new way of work and do not want to the return to the old procedures (ordering by telephone, fax, etc.). On the county council side, approximately 30 percentage of county councils have introduced electronic commerce.
E-commerce for the suppliers, especially SMEs
Another important aspect is that businesses (suppliers of goods and services) with which the public sector trades are able to trade electronically. Inputs have been made to promote the use of electronic transactions in particular for small and medium-sized enterprises. Collaboration is taking place here between the public and the business sector. Among other things, the organisation NEA (Network for Electronic Commerce) has been created by the public sector and the business sector. The Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions, the Federation of County Councils and the Swedish Agency for Administrative Development are members of NEA together with the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise, IT-Företagen (the Association of Swedish IT companies), the Swedish Bankers’ Association and also a number of companies. The intention has been to promote the use and development of electronic transactions. Another important aim of the collaboration is to promote the standardisation work with regard to electronic transactions. For more information, see www.nea.nu
Background regarding e-procurement
A short background is here giving regarding why we have been working with e-procurement in public sector for the last twelve years. Work has taken place at the national level for the past twelve years to facilitate the introduction of electronic procurement in the public sector. In 1994, an initiative was taken to see how it would be possible to simplify and rationalise the purchasing processes. The Government, the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and the Swedish Federation of County Councils started a project to stimulate the development and use of electronic procurement One of the major tasks in the national project was to develop an open standard for exchange of commercial communications. This standard would be used by the undertakings, which developed services for electronic procurement through the framework agreement. The industry standard SFTI (Single Face to Industry), is a standard ”all to all”, i.e. where a supplier can send commercial communications (for instance, invoices) based on the same standard regardless of whether he is trading with one or more municipalities, county councils or other undertakings. Likewise, it is to be possible for a municipality trading with a number of undertakings to use the same standard with all of them. A number of commercial solutions have been developed based on this standard, SFTI.
The work on promoting the introduction of electronic procurement has continued since then at central level. The project was terminated in 1998, although work on promoting the introduction of electronic commerce and recommendation of the industry standard SFTI is now taking place as part of the activities of the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions, the Swedish Agency for Administrative Development and the National Financial management Authority. We started by producing a standard for the actual sub-ordering process i.e. sub-orders based on an existing framework agreement and where an electronic invoice is subsequently received. This can mean that the ordering party has the price information or that sub-orders are placed on the supplier’s website. Standards are also available for so-called periodic invoices. Two reports have been produced on public procurement, which show how an invitation to tender could be structured to be available in electronic form and how tenders can be matched with it. All information about specifications and the two reports are available on the website www.ehandel.skl.se and www.sfti.se. Security specifications have been produced. The reports on electronic public procurement are a beginning. We hope that we can continue this work together with other countries in the EU and in connection with the new procurement directives and legislation in the member states. It is important to carry out the whole procurement process electronically. The EDI has so far been based on Edifact but we will also start a mapping of the specifications into XML-format.
E-invoices as a complement to EDI
As mentioned above we have a complement for the EDI-standard in SFTI which is an e-invoice. It is a complement to the integrated EDI and also an alternative to scanning of e-invoices. It is the Svefaktura, ”SwedInvoice”. It was developed in a working group with representatives from both buyers, suppliers and IT-providers. The cooperation gave a good result. The SwedInvoice is now implemented in several IT-solutions and some local authorities and their suppliers have already started to use it. There is also an opportunity for test on the web-site. For further information, please see www.svefaktura.se.
The SwedInvoice is based on OASIS standard UBL, which is the same as the Danish OIO XML invoice. We also cooperate with the Nordic countries and UK for the further development of UBL (version 2.0) and to find a sub-set for a northern european e-invoice standard. But it is also important for us to promote the merge of UBL into UN/CEFACT.
Finally I can add that besides the work on the industry standard SFTI, we are promoting the introduction of electronic procurement and e-invoicing by training, information and the provision of advice. We also give information at different conferences in Sweden but also abroad. As an example we will give a presentation about the current status of e-invocing and e-procurement in Sweden at the EXPP Summit in Berlin in September.
Autor/Author: Kerstin Wiss Holmdahl
Quelle/Source: eGov monitor, 30.05.2006
