Automation of Bank Reconciliation Process

Unattended Automation

Client and engagement information

The process entails reconciliation of 70+ bank accounts in 6 Banks with the Ledger book (MS Dynamics ERP).

The Challenge

The business process was routine, time consuming and mundane with multiple repetitive tasks. The Process needed to be performed on a daily basis to check for any discrepancies and also to detect fraudulent transactions.
Errors at any stages of the process would require the entire reconciliation to be re-worked. Client processes sensitive data to be sent to head office on a daily basis , the absence would impact key decision making processes.
The client’s reconciliation process involved handling a large volume of files that needed to be downloaded from the Bank’s website and processing in the Core Ledger System.
Multiple process scenarios, time norms and different file types made the process complex. Downloading and uploading multiple information and consolidating it manually was leading to errors, inconsistency and data integrity issues.

Key Information

Solution: Our Approach

RPA maturity assessment

Using their proprietary RPA maturity framework, MBG accessed the business process to ascertain the feasibility of Robotics Process Automation (RPA). Each process step was analyzed in detail, to optimize the business process cost-effectively. The assessment included designing a compelling business case. The business case was developed using various metrics obtained from the client such as Average handling time and SLAs among others. The RPA maturity rating, as per our framework, validated that this process was the ideal candidate for Robotic Process Automation.

RPA Implementation

The assessment concluded that the process was viable for automation and demonstrated an effective business case. MBG automated the business process as per its RPA Development Lifecycle. The MBG team performed user acceptance testing (UAT) and deployed the automated process into production. The client’s finance and Product and control team was trained in BOT usage and exception handling, as a part of supporting their routine operational activities.

Hypercare (Support period)

MBG also provided RPA technical training for the selected staff from the client to enable them to manage and support the robots deployed and shared a Handbook accordingly.

Manual Process (AS-IS)

• Download the Bank statements from bank portals for a specific period
• Login to MS Dynamics.
• Download ledger statements for a given period.
• Extract the information and reconcile manually.
• Generate Reconciliation reports.
• Email notifications to SME.
• Update the Discrepancies.
• Send reports to the management.

Automated TO-BE:

The BOT performs the following tasks as part of the automated process:

• Robots waits for trigger email
• Read email with subject ‘run card recon bot’
• Creation of standard folder
• Login to bank portals
• Download bank statements
• Login to MS Dynamics
• Download the Ledger statements
• Extraction of data and upload to database
• Run reconciliation report queries
• Generation of reconciliation reports
• Send success email with discrepancy report

Benefits/ Value Delivered

The automation of the process resulted in the following benefits:

• 95% effort automated and Quality improvement to 100% accuracy
• Re Deployment of 1 FTE to value added tasks
• Reduction in AHT from 96 hrs to 3.5 hrs
• Improved SLAs on report submission as Processing time is reduced by 80%
• Manual data entry errors avoided
• Higher standardization of process
• Resources upskilled and deployed into the organizations Center of Excellence (CoE)