"Financial Planning System" of "St. Petersburg National International Telephone"

"Saint-Petersburg National International Telephone" ("SPB NIT") and LEAVES Company have been working in close cooperation on the project for the development and implementation of the Computerized Corporate Information System that is being built taking account of the latest developments in the computer industry and commercial innovations.

The Project's Mission includes much more than just implementing modern technologies - first of all, it seeks to maintain and enhance a competitive potential of the oldest organisation in the Russian telecommunications industry, expand and diversify services provided to its customers, and promote a new, market-oriented corporate management structure to achieve a dominant position on the long-distance and international telecommunications services market.

Over this period, more than 30 experts have participated in the project on both sides, including almost all senior managers of both companies. The project management function has also been shared.

During the implementation of the project, auditing was one of the priority areas. The purpose of auditing activities was to establish a valid model of the business processes that were to be computerized, to identify incorrect information and "non-formalized" management processes. It was followed by streamlining those processes taking advantage of the potential provided by computer technologies and the development of internal regulations clearly describing interaction between individual departments of the company, including areas of responsibility with respect to input and updating of information.

This approach sought to achieve the following major objectives: elimination data duplication both across departments and within given departments (which was the case in the old fragmented subsystems); input of data in the point where it is generated by the staff responsible for the data.

Examples of such data are personal cards, chart of accounts, customers directory, inventory lists which were used almost in every subsystem.

Based on the above standard documents, detailed process descriptions have been developed for each subsystem within the project, describing both general technologies of the subsystems and detailed operating instructions for each form view or report.

Major emphasis was made on the development of technical documentation describing the data model specific software modules and packages. This information enable SPB NIT staff to eventually achieve independence from the developer in the system technical support.

For the same purpose, a number of specifications have been developed, including:

Specifications for the description of software packages
Documentation specifications
User interface specifications

The above standards allow to improve both maintainability of the system and reduce the learning time for system users as once a user has gained experience in using one subsystem and document preparation procedures, he will easily come to terms with new subsystems that have an identical interface. In addition, this approach improves interaction between users and the "help desk" group, as well as between users themselves.
Most of the subsystems are currently undergoing operational tests or have been put into commercial operation. The subsystems already developed contribute to improving current capital efficiency, streamlining of the use of inventories, preventing errors and inconsistencies in the historic data accumulated by the enterprise using legacy information systems (mainframe-type).

The Financial Planning System is intended to provide information and analytical support across all levels of SPB NIT management structure and, eventually, provide integrated and valid data on the enterprise's activities at the director level, which will enable decision-making process to be based on accurate and standardized information.

The FPS includes the following subsystems:

Personnel
Payroll
Inventory Accounting
Payment Documents Generation and Records. Purchase Ledger
General Ledger and Balance Sheet

Personnel

The "Personnel" application is designed to provide computerized support of various personnel data and intended to address the key tasks undertaken by the Human Resource Department: Provision of accurate and detailed data on employees, departments and units, staffing schedule, orders and the enterprise's wage rate distribution to various units of the Human Resource Department and other information systems of the enterprise, as all systems use, in a greater or lesser degree, data stored within the "Personnel" system.

During the development of the "Personnel" system, significant time was spent to address issues related to improving coordination between departments that maintain or use information generated by the system, in particular the Personnel Department and Labor Safety and Payroll Department.

As a result, a technology ensuring seamless inter-departmental coordination was developed which was described in the documentation and approved by SPB NIT management.

Clear allocation of functional responsibilities between individual units of the Human Resource Department. Each workstation of the "Personnel" system has clearly defined access to data and is responsible for the accuracy of data within its area, and also can use data for the accuracy of which another "workstation" is responsible, thus achieving general access to data and preventing inconsistencies or multiple duplication of information quantity.

It results in a decrease of time required by the employees of the Human Resource Department for processing personnel data and generating relevant reports.

Where a new employee is recruited based on the order and documents provided by the employee, the Personnel inputs into his "Personal Card" information on the employee, his children and dependants, salary, etc. From then on, the Personnel Department, based on relevant orders, will input information on all movements of the employee within the enterprise, his promotions, any changes in the type and amount of his salary, i.e. the entire history of this employee during his work at the enterprise (for the purposes of payroll calculations, all charges and deductions are to be made in accordance with the historical records) and other information.

The subsystem includes 45 view forms and 57 reports.

Payroll

The "Payroll Calculations" subsystem supports all payroll-related calculations. The subsystem has a modular structure and incorporates the following modules:

Regulatory and reference information
Personnel data (partly from the "personnel")
Taxation card
Online information
Preparation for payroll calculations
Payments
Courier service
Contract agreements
Labor contracts
Changes of payment periods
Data archive

The subsystems' directories store information that is used for payroll calculations and generation of various reports. Reference information maintained with the "Personnel" subsystem and personnel data are used for payroll calculations.

This subsystem maintains supports information on income, discounts, deductions and income tax. Initially, this information is input into the system from the "Personal Income Statement" obtained from the previous job. The subsystem complies with the requirements of the Russian legislation.

The subsystem supports a significant number of help functions. The enterprise's employees can input and view information on various charges and/or deductions, whether non-recurrent or spread over a time period.

Where a receiving order has been issued against an employee, information on payments due under such receiving order will be input into the subsystem.

At the employee' request, a percentage of his wages or a fixed amount can be transferred into his bank account.

Regular payments to and/or deductions from an employee's wages during a defined period can be specified. Where the total amount of retention is not known, deductions will be made till the relevant amount is fully paid, while the balance will be tracked automatically.

This subsystem is customized to specific needs of the SPB NIT, and includes functionality to automatically calculate additional payments for courier service and fully integrate the results of those payments within the system (accompanied by relevant tax calculations and reporting).

The subsystem has a seamless interface with the subsystem "General Ledger and Balance Sheet" and transfers to the latter the results of payroll calculations as accounting entries.

The subsystem includes 110 view forms and 65 reports.

Inventory Accounting

The first version of the subsystem only included the Asset Accounting module, and has been in commercial operation over one year.

Currently, the subsystem is expanded with the required modules that enable to fully computerize processes of inventory accounting. The subsystem supports the following functions:

Receipt of inventories (including acquisitions, proceeds from barter transactions, etc.)
Release of inventories from the warehouse, movement of inventories across departments, write-offs of inventories, sales of inventories to third parties
Interface with inventory records
Stock-taking

The subsystem is organically integrated with other subsystems within the Financial Planning System, such as "Payment Documents Generation and Records", "Purchase Ledger Generation", "Personnel", "General Ledger and Balance Sheet".

The implementation of the system has enabled to streamline allocation of functional responsibilities between various units and departments of the enterprise, to provide accurate information on available inventories and, as a result, to reduce costs through better use of inventories. The system can also increase personal responsibility of employees for inventories as it includes effective monitoring tools.

The subsystem includes 70 view forms and 40 reports.

Payment Documents Generation and Records. General Ledger.

During the development of this subsystem, emphasis was made on creating the document "Corporate Standard. Main Principles of Cost Analysis Accounting". This document provided a basis for design and process solutions. This subsystem is one of the main components of the Financial Planning Subsystem providing management of the enterprise with information on current payments, their originators, payment authorizations and processing. Managers of the enterprise can use this subsystem to make quick decisions related to the streamlining of payments, and proactively, rather than reactively, address various situations.

Analysis of information accumulated within the subsystem provides a foundation for strategic planning based on accurate and reliable data on the enterprise's cost structure.The subsystem incorporates the following modules:

Input of source documents that serve as a basis for payments
Generation of payment orders
Printing of payment orders
Deletion of unpaid payment orders
Loading of statements of accounts
Documents supporting statements of accounts
Generation of accounts of non-acceptance payments
Input of invoices
Linking invoices to payment documents
Printing of invoices
Invoice register
Input of receipt documents
Input of bills of lading and receipt orders
Input of payment certificates for work completed/services provided
Generation of statements related to payment transactions completed by the bank
Linking invoices to receipt documents
Generation of the Purchase Ledger
Printing of the Purchase Ledger
Changes in the Purchase Ledger
Maintenance of regulatory documents
Generation of statements of payments made by the enterprise
Receipt of statements of bank accounts
General management and control

The subsystem includes 105 view forms and 54 reports.

General Ledger and Balance Sheet

This subsystem was designed to computerize accounting. The system allows to generate accounting reports for any reporting date for internal and external users. Source information for this subsystem is generated by all other subsystems providing data in the form accounting entries, various statements, breakdowns, memos and schedules.

This information system supports the following functions:

Generation of a consolidated file of entries from the existing subsystems
Generation of entries in the subsystem "General Ledger"
Self-balancing capability
Automatic calculation of taxes and charges
Automatic generation of closing entries at the end of the accounting period
Automatic generation of accounting reports

The subsystem includes 35 view forms and 10 extremely complex reports.

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