Optimise your Invoicing Process: Introduction to OCR Invoice Capture in Dynamics 365 Finance integrated with Power Platform
This invoice capture solution automatically creates supplier invoices from digital invoice images using AI and ML technologies called Optical Character Recognition (OCR) and Robotic Process Automation (RPA).
OCR is being used in different industries and it is very common to digitise texts, so that they can be edited electronically and stored in a correct way in order to be able to access this information more easily.
The transformation of a digital text can be used in different automated processes such as cognitive services, translation, text-to-speech etc.
The evolution of artificial intelligence (AI) technology has enabled OCR solutions to read different invoice formats from different suppliers without the need for much human intervention. This is why companies are opting to use these cognitive services,
Necessary functions
In this blog I will tell you about the basic features, installation, configuration of this model-based application and how it forms a solution and integrates with Dynamics 365 Finance and operations.
Roles
Depending on the tasks to be performed, certain roles will be required, here are some of them:
- Dynamics 365 administrator
- Power Platform administrator
- Storage Blob data owner
- InvoiceCaptureOperator: (role must be included in the role settings to successfully run the derivation and validation logic in Invoice capture, and to transfer the invoice to Dynamics 365 Finance)
- Environment maker: Must be assigned to the Accounts payable administrator if they create channels in Invoice capture.
License
At the moment of starting to use an application, and recommended before installing it, it should be clear what type of license is required, as this can exponentially increase or decrease the client’s costs at the moment of wanting to use this type of application.
For this application the following licenses should be considered for Dynamics 365 Finance customers:
- Power Apps license (per user) — To access Invoice capture, users must access Power Apps.
- Azure Data Lake Storage subscription :It is more recommendable since most of the times the clients have available in dataverse the price of the licenses they use and they do not always have a space that allows them to store a lot of data and files, which implies additional costs.
- Invoice processing fee based on number of invoices
Install Invoice capture solution
Prerequisites
- The Power Platform environment must be created.
- The finance and operations virtual entity must be installed in the Power Platform environment.
The following Dynamics 365 Finance versions are required before installing Invoice capture (1.1.0.10 +):
- Dynamics 365 Finance 10.0.36 10.0.1695.28 or later
- Dynamics 365 Finance 10.0.35 10.0.1627.86 or later
- Dynamics 365 Finance 10.0.34 10.0.1591.124 or later
Activate a feature in Dynamics Finance and Operations
Go to System administration > workspaces > feature management
And now go to Accounts payable > Set up > Invoice capture, where we can already see the invoice capture shortcut
When you press invoice capture, you will find the initial configuration, before installing the application on Power platform through the app source:
The option Sync all vendors is enabled by default. This option synchronizes any changes or additions to vendors within onboarded legal entities from Dynamics 365 finance and operations to Invoice capture in real-time.
Select whether an invoice attachment should be transferred together with the invoice from Invoice capture. When the parameter is enabled, confirm the default document file is assigned to the File field on the Default document types page.
Install and set up the solution
This application integrates with a power platform environment through virtual entities, that is why we must install the functionality or check if it is available in the environment.
Install Invoice Capture:
Go to Appsource Invoice Capture for Dynamics 365 Finance (microsoft.com)
Important tip
After installation, go to Setup system > Manage legal entities and Manage vendors to sync the entries from Dynamics 365 Finance.
Invoice Capture consists of two modules, Manage invoice and setup system .
Configure Channels
In this example we will set up a mailing template
When you create a new connection, a flow is automatically created, which you can manage from the same registry.
The other settings are left as default, and we will take a basic example of an invoice to be sent by mail.
We generate an invoice for a purchase order number 000017 in Dynamics 365 finance and operations
When printing the invoice it is saved as PDF
Subsequently we send the mail that will arrive to the one configured in the channel.
It is important to set the file size to avoid errors like the ones shown below:
Managed file filter
We can observe that the invoice has been correctly analysed by the application, entering the main data of the invoice, in the menu captured invoices.
By selecting the record we can view the OCR-processed invoice.
When you click on transfer invoice, the invoice remains as pending to be registered in Dynamics 365 Finance and operations.
As we can see, the functionality is not complex in its installation, but it requires several configurations that are important for the application to work correctly, configuration in power platform and in dynamics 365 finance and operations. This functionality can be very useful if configured correctly as it integrates AI with power automate and model driven flows as an application.
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