Broken Billing Process at the SeaCube Container Leasing Company

Mary Linn of Ocean Carriers is evaluating the purchase of a new capesize carrier for a 3-year lease proposed by a motivated customer. The leasing contract offers very attractive terms, but no ship in Ocean Carrier’s current fleet meets the customer’s needs. In addition, the proposed contract with the customer is only for three years. Therefore, after three years, the

Sales invoices are prepared in batches on a daily basis using numbered sales invoices. Sales invoice numbers are automatically generated by the company’s computer system. The accounts receivable clerk does not have appropriate computer rights to override the computer-generated invoice number. Upon preparing sales invoices, the accounts receivable clerk verifies that the first invoice number of the batch is consistent with the last invoice number of the previous batch. Inconsistencies or skipped sales invoice numbers are investigated and resolved before new sales invoices are prepared. The items shipped are compared to the items billed for proper quantity, price, and other sales order terms.

Growing number of businesses and practices such as those in the legal profession are investing in legal billing software to streamline service delivery. These tools have become critical even as many businesses are focused on reducing cost and ensuring they operated optimally. An

Consequently, the potential increased volume of transactions and vendors would require an increase in the number of employees to perform the activities if the existing process were to be maintained. The increase in transaction and vendor volumes would be relative to the amount of time it takes to manage the invoicing of vendor payments. Of the six days per month taken to manage the processes, four days are for invoicing, which would now need to be multiplied by four, resulting in 16 days per month, more than half of the month being spent processing invoices by one of The Store’s admin team. This is valuable time taken away from more productive activities.

I am attaching both the current and the previous invoices for your reference. Let me know if you have any questions.

Lighthouse provides a ship tracking service for shipping companies to locate their ships at sea, as well as knowing their speed and the weather they are facing. Lighthouse does a contract for the delivery and installation of the physical device that is capable of achieving this through a tracking service that calls for a second contract. The price for the dedicated hardware (exclusive to Lighthouse services) and installation is a single nonrefundable amount of $10,000 payable at completion of installation and acceptance by client. When this is done, the location service can be provided. The service contract which is generally for one year is paid monthly at $300 per month. Customers may cancel the service contract at anytime.

A cell phone invoice is received for $75. The invoice is for services provided during 
the month of December and is due on January 15.

Team 5 also recommends implementing an automated process system that automatically scans and enters invoices into the payment processing software. With the implementation of this software, Pay Later Invoices and Pay Now Invoices can be eliminated from the process. Additionally, Team 5 suggests moving the two employees from Pay Now and Pay Later Invoices to the Final Check activity. This will eliminate the bottleneck of over utilization at the Final Check because the number of employees increases to three. Although the utilization decreases by over 30%, it leaves room for variability and decreases the stress put

Baldwin's purchasing, inventorying, and production costs over and above the added costs that would be

I would greatly appreciate it if you would support this by submitting these invoices for

Invoices are accounted for as spent as soon as the work has been performed. Another inadequacy with

Each debit entry should be corroborated by an appropriate sales invoice agreeing as to amount and customer.

A proper billing system such as thermal receipt printer connected to a computer can be able to give any customer a precise bill that is clean, clear & completely

Ocean Carriers Inc. was approached in January of 2001 with a contract proposal for the leasing of one of their ships for a term of 3 years beginning in 2003. Ocean Carriers currently has no ship to accommodate the customer. To commission the construction of a new vessel would take 2 years from start to completion. The average rate in the spot market is $22,000 per day. Ocean Carriers deployed a younger fleet than average carriers and generally earned a 15% premium over the average daily rate placing them in position to capitalize in strong economies. However, the industry is volatile and suseptable to extremes both low and high. Many ship owners sought to sign contracts with time charters in order to shield themselves from the swings

Another factor Service refers to fast processing of documents, bill of lading and prompt loading and movement of containers etc. It is rather difficult for customers to get better quality of service than getting competitive freight rates. In this world of technology every company is trying to adapt to new technology in their day to day businesses like e-processing of documents and fastest data entry to name a few. Maersk is so technologically advanced in this field that all its data processing is being done electronically by back office and customers are able to access all information relevant to shipment though dedicated space available on company website. Examples electronic processes are shipping bills, vessel certificates, freight invoices and bill of lading in encrypted format once the payment is done by customer either electronically or at Maersk local office. Companies like APL and MSC do have electronic processing systems but are not fully fledged and as a result much of the work is still being done manually.