Kowalski’s spoke with their trusted IT Vendor and Authorized DocuWare Partner, who introduced them to DocuWare.

The solution was piloted in the headquarters store for a few months, then rolled out to all 12 stores, one at a time, over the course of the next 3 months.

Today invoices are scanned at each store and automatically indexed using DocuWare’s Intelligent Indexing feature, which is an AI service that learns how to “recognize” index terms wherever they are on a page. Next, the invoices are electronically routed to the department head, who fixes any missing or incorrect index terms and reviews the costs. Using an electronic stamp, the invoice is routed to the corporate accounting office where it is given one final review before being stored in DocuWare.

A tight integration between DocuWare and Kowalski’s accounting solution, Sage, allows the accounting staff quick access to documents stored in DocuWare, right from within their familiar accounting program.

Kowalski’s has eliminated more than 40 hours a week in data entry time and their employees have more time to dedicate to the key part of their jobs.

The accounting department can instantly answer vendor questions about being short paid. One of the biggest benefits the accounting department has seen is that they no longer look up information for department managers as these managers now have searchable, self-serve access to important accounting information.

For Tony Olufson, the Accounting Manager, the biggest benefit is being able to instantly perform a cost analysis. Vendor relations have been positively impacted now that answers are readily on hand and the company is able to take full advantage of early payment discounts.

When Kowalski’s rolled out the solution, they discovered the upfront customer facing departments didn’t understand how much work the back end or accounting department was doing.

Converting paper records to digital ones, has eliminated 384 boxes of records a year that Kowalski’s will no longer need to physically store.