Process Accounting

Process Accounting is an
approach for business process-
based supply chain
management. A Process
Accounting system starts with
extensive built-in functionality:
Balances, transfers, and
exchanges of products,
services, and monies
Generation, presentation, and
exchange of business
documents (orders, invoices,
statements, reports, etc.)
Periodic, threshold,
predictive, and event-driven
action triggers
Process-based follow-up,
prompting, validation, and
recording of all events
Workflow automation with
role-based routing and
authorization
Multiple price components
per transaction to reflect
discounts, premiums,
surcharges, promotions, etc.
Multiple parties per exchange
to reflect 3rd party service
providers, regulatory
agencies, taxing authorities,
etc.
Historical tracking able to re-
create any state, balance, or
document from any point in
time
Causality analysis able to link
sequences of actions to final
results and vice versa
Static views for tax reporting,
dynamic views for real-world
performance analysis
Non-destructive error
correction and multi-party
discrepancy resolution
Fine-grained reporting able
to calculate gross margin for
every specific product unit
Universal process model
allows definition of virtually
any type of business process
Universal account model
represents events from any
point of view
Universal event model
records past and scheduled
events in a process context
Universal item model
supports conversion,
substitution, and bundling
Universal currency model
supports configurable
conversion and translation
for each account
Process Accounting systems then
allow you to specify detailed
business processes that reflect
the way you:
Order products from and
return products to suppliers
Settle and reconcile supplier
accounts
Manufacture, assemble, and
recycle products
Manage product inventories
Deliver products to and
process returns from
customers
Invoice and reconcile
customer accounts
Manage internal finances
The basic idea is that everything
you do is part of a business
process, but nothing specific
about business processes is
hard-coded into the system.
Setting up a Process Accounting
system mostly involves defining
your process models and
configuring your cosmetic look-
and-feel preferences. You get all
the benefits of process-based
convenience, control, reporting,
and analysis, and you don't
have to adapt your business to
work the way your software
does. You also avoid the huge
time and investment required to
customize and implement
traditional SCM or ERP systems.
Over the last several years, as
the Process Accounting
approach has taken shape,
portions have been developed
and tested in the field. In 1997,
an early proof-of-concept
system named BookDis was
developed to manage retail
book distribution for the
European Book Company in San
Francisco. BookDis implemented
roughly 30% of the Process
Accounting approach and is still
in active production use today.
In 1999, a more powerful system
named Trade was developed to
handle wholesale periodical
supply chain operations and
account management. A true
enterprise application prototype,
Trade implemented roughly half
the Process Accounting
approach and successfully
managed operations for two
years until the business line was
shut down in 2001.
Although a full implementation
has never been built, the
Process Accounting approach is
based on well-established
concepts and field-tested design
components. Tempest Solutions
believes that the Process
Accounting approach represents
the future of SCM and a
foundation for the next big step
forward in ERP and CRM
systems. Process Accounting is
available today either as a
conceptual model for a custom
solution or as a blueprint for a
commercial enterprise software
package.