Oh dear mail

According to the Institute for Business Informatics at Leibniz Universität Hannover, in Germany around six billion invoices are sent by traditional mail every year.

This is time-consuming and cost-intensive: the documents have to be printed, folded, enveloped, the envelopes sealed and franked. The postage for a standard letter is currently 58 cents.

Added to this are the Costs for consumables such as stationery, envelopes or toner. Even the trip to the Mail must be taken into account.

Business communication via e-mail is more economical, simpler and faster - regardless of the industry. E-mail is also superior to fax in terms of cost and speed.

Many companies that SAP ERP provide customers, prospects, suppliers and partners with the necessary information for business communication. SAP-documents still in paper form.

But why not ERP for delivering business mail by e-mail?

Easier said than done, because the ERP-Standard does not offer a comfortable tool for e-mail traffic. Thus, the standard has deficits in such important topics as recipient determination, mail processing, file attachment management and mail design.

Companies that SAP ERP use and SAP-They need an IT solution that can be seamlessly integrated into the existing IT environment. SAP-system, can be flexibly adapted to the respective business process and is compatible with the Emails directly in the ERP backend can be created, edited and sent.

Munich Enterprise Software's m/e/s Mailcenter meets these and other requirements. The Add-on was developed on the basis of ABAP and with ABAP Objects as an object-oriented extension and can be used modification-free and release-safe in SAP ERP be embedded.

Outlook is available with the help of the OLE-Technology (Object Linking and Embedding) is integrated into the user interface via a separate button.

Flexible adjustment

The add-on is easy to use and can be flexibly adapted to the different needs regarding the mail design of Distribution, Purchasing or shipping customize.

A high degree of automation and standardization is usually required for sending delivery bills and also invoices. But for writing offers with high value to strategically important prospects and customers, individual mail processing is required. The cover letter here should be rather personal.

Cockpit as central entry point

The solution provides end-to-end IT support for emailing various business documents directly from SAP ERP and shortens the communication channels to customers, prospects and partners. All relevant data and information, such as current status, company name, mail recipient, or object key, are bundled clearly and process-related on a central user interface, the cockpit.

This ensures a high level of transparency: after starting the application, each user is shown his or her entire e-mail correspondence, i.e., sent as well as unsent and still-to-be-processed messages, within the scope of his or her role and authorization.

Automatic receiver determination

Recipient identification and maintenance plays an important role in emailing. The Add-on automatically determines to whom the mail should be sent. For sending Emails one or more incoming, Cc and Bcc recipients can already be preset in the master data.

A simple, transaction-specific correction of the recipient data is possible at any time. Recipients can also be determined on a transaction-specific basis depending on document contents.

There are also useful functions for managing contact persons, which lowers the hurdles to contact data maintenance. For example, it can be used to maintain in the customer master which customer has agreed to the invoice being sent by mail, whether explicitly or tacitly by paying the electronically transmitted invoice.

Flexible mail processing

Pre-formulated texts with variables, for example to add the document number, can be stored for standard e-mails, but these can be changed at any time. At the same time, there is the option of formulating personal cover letters and Emails individual design.

The content of each mail can be checked once again before it is delivered, and the texts can be adjusted as required. The dispatch of the Emails including the file attachments is done either directly via the mail center, automatically in the background or via Microsoft Outlook.

In addition, a special "Mail To Go" function allows messages to be sent directly from an edited application document. The sent Emails are then logged together with the attachments and linked to the SAP-document. This ensures transparency, because the transmission reports can be called up in the document and the dispatch can be traced without gaps.

Attach documents and files easily

At Add-on can be specified that certain documents such as the General Terms and Conditions (GTC) or Marketing-flyer are added automatically. These file attachments originate from a central directory that can be accessed via SAP ERP can be accessed.

Also documents that are stored in the Document management system (SAP DMS) can be attached: For example, design drawings that the Purchasing transmitted to suppliers together with an inquiry or purchase order, or product descriptions submitted to the Distribution attached to an offer email.

Last but not least, documents such as Word or Excel files can be selected from the local PC and attached to an e-mail, as long as the document is created with the generic SAP-Generic Object Services (GOS).

In addition, the Add-on other useful functions for design. For example, in the Emails hyperlinks are included to business partners that lead to information about the company's own products and services.

In addition, mail texts, signatures and Disclaimer uniformly and in accordance with the corporate identity guidelines: This has a positive effect on the external image of the company.

Last but not least, the use of the solution also fulfills the requirements of the legislator for the long-term, unchangeable and secure storage of electronic messages.

This way the Emails can also be stored in a legally compliant manner in an external storage system via SAP ArchiveLink after dispatch. The ROI is also impressive: Since the use of m/e/s Mailcenter saves far more than just postage costs, in many cases its introduction pays for itself in less than a year.

Thilo Kiefer is a member of the management team at m/e/s - Munich Enterprise Software. After working as a systems analyst at Siemens and consultant at SAP Steeb, he has been part of the m/e/s management team since 2005. He is responsible for the areas of strategy, business development and portfolio management.