Border crossers in the accounts receivable business

Andreas Prantner has been responsible for master data, credit and receivables management at RWA Raiffeisen Ware Austria since 2013 as Head of Department Accounts Receivable/Creditors.

One of his first tasks: to complete the project already underway and map integrated credit and risk management in the SAP system using add-ons from SAP channel partner Cormeta.

The business segments of the RWA group of companies include the areas of agriculture, technology, energy, building materials, and construction & garden. RWA as parent company means mainly classical wholesale, B2B. So in the agricultural sector relationships with grain mills, oil mills, fertilizer manufacturers.

The Group also includes two energy companies, Genol as a wholesaler and Wärme Austria as an end-customer supplier. One-third of the end customers are commercial enterprises and two-thirds are private households, which purchase oil or pellets, for example.

"This is our bulk debit business with about 70,000 energy customers"

Prantner says.

The technology segment includes trading in agricultural machinery on the one hand and the sale of tires and spare parts on the other. Here, RWA has a mixed customer structure ranging from farmers to commercial customers and also exports tires and technology abroad, especially to Southern and Eastern Europe. Overall, a rather heterogeneous customer structure that requires sensitive credit and risk management.

The initial situation

In recent years, the group expanded to include several companies that first had to be centralized and then integrated into SAP.

In the context of company acquisitions, RWA also took over existing contracts, including insurance contracts.

"In addition, we have many of the same customers at different business units and we wanted to be able to map this cluster risk transparently. Managing that as before was a Sisyphean task. The existing team could hardly handle all that."

says department head Prantner.

Phase I

The goals were clearly defined - in the future, everything should be able to be processed end-to-end in SAP: Credit management, credit insurance, including comprehensive fulfillment of contractual obligations, collateral management, and credit checks directly in SAP through the connection of credit agencies.

And all this by means of integrating Cormeta's add-on programs. Thus, project phase I started in 2013 with the aim of introducing the SAP add-ons KVsprint, RMsprint and CGsprint - i.e. the solutions for credit insurance management, credit and risk management as well as the connection to the credit agencies.

Phase II

Prantner took over the project, which is now in Phase II, in October 2013 as a lateral hire. It includes the integration of the mass debitors, the expansion of the information interfaces and the integration of the CEE subsidiaries.

"Eight people including myself work with the Cormeta add-ons. Three are specialized in credit management and need the software on a daily basis. Four employees take care of receivables management and use the add-ons to keep track of everything."

Prantner reports.

In this context, the Cormeta Start Cockpit offers an ideal opportunity to start with a customer research.

Today, RWA uses the Cormeta add-ons KVsprint for the management of credit insurance, RMsprint for risk management and the credit agency connection CGsprint.

The administration of insurance contracts in KVsprint has been simplified considerably, all limits have been standardized in RMsprint and the cluster risk has been reduced significantly.

"The three solutions look like they come from the same mold because of the seamless integration of processes. With one or two clicks, I can get an overview of a customer, their entire history, with credit limits, credit agency indices, etc."

the department head praises his new tools.

Especially when working with credit insurance, RWA has great advantages as a result. All inquiries are automatically answered digitally.

"There's no more faxing, no more overflowing mailboxes. The whole billing and administration part for insurance has improved."

And the new system is already close to the return on investment. The whole process is not yet completed, but the "i can do more with the same number of employees today. That is immediately noticeable."