Introduction
Project Objective: Automate the processing of incoming finance application reports received via Outlook. Tasks include categorizing reports, uploading them to SharePoint, organizing them into monthly and yearly folders, renaming files appropriately, and maintaining a record of received emails for SOX audits. The finance applications involved are Coupa, Netsuite, RevPro, Klarity, Stripe, and Gappify.
Problem Statement: Finance users and stakeholders spent significant time each month categorizing emails, taking screenshots, downloading attachments, renaming files, creating folders by month and year, and sharing links with SOX auditors for monthly and quarterly data. This manual process was time-consuming and prone to errors.
Challenges
- Manual Processes: Users spent significant time categorizing emails, downloading attachments, and organizing files manually.
- Time-Consuming: The process of renaming files, creating folders, and sharing links with auditors was highly inefficient and error-prone.
- Inconsistent File Organization: Due to manual processes, file names and folder structures were inconsistent, leading to errors during audits.
Solution
The finance department implemented Microsoft Power Automate to streamline and automate the finance report processing workflow:
- Automated Email Categorization
- Configured Power Automate to process incoming emails via the Outlook Connector.
- Created rules to categorize emails based on the subject line and defined file format for differentiating applications. - Automated SharePoint Folder Creation
- Developed workflows to create application-specific folders in SharePoint.
- Automatically generated monthly and yearly folders under each application’s path in SharePoint. - File Renaming and Upload
- Automated the renaming of attachments and conversion of email content into .eml format screenshots.
- Uploaded all files into the designated SharePoint folders. - Stakeholder Notifications
- Sent automated email notifications to stakeholders with updated SharePoint links for easy access to reports.
Results
- Reduced Manual Effort: The automation reduced the time spent on processing and organizing finance application reports by 80%.
- Consistent File Organization: Ensured standardized file naming and folder structures, improving the audit process for SOX compliance.
- Enhanced Productivity: By automating notifications and report sharing, stakeholders were kept informed, improving communication and productivity.
- Minimized Errors: Automated workflows ensured consistent file formats and reduced manual errors, enhancing data integrity.
Conclusion
This automation project significantly streamlined the processing of finance application reports, saving time and effort for finance teams while ensuring compliance with SOX audit requirements. Leveraging Power Automate with Outlook and SharePoint, the solution delivered a robust, scalable, and efficient workflow for managing critical financial data.
