Housing to OA – Invoice Interfacing Errors
Each night at 8pm, an interface runs within Housing Enterprise that notifies OpenAccounts which repairs invoices have been authorised for payment.
It is important that this interface is monitored to ensure there are no invoices getting stuck within the interface and that our contractors are getting paid on schedule.
Checking the Interface
Check to see if there are any invoices stuck within the interface.
- Batch Job Admin
-
Program Name
-
bjfisex1.p – OA Approved Inv Export – Current
-
bjfisex0.p – OA Approved Inv Export – Prior
- Click on the Search button.
Figure 1: Batch Admin, Program Name & Search
These two batch files will show the nightly spool files for the invoice interface between OH and OA for the current and prior periods respectively.
- From the list of results, highlight the most recently completed report.
- Click on the Spool Files button located at the bottom of the screen.
This will open the List Print Requests window
- Highlight the line with BPL Inv Errors in the Text column
- Click on the Contents button
Figure 2: BPL Inv Errors & Contents button
This will open the File Viewer, which will let you know whether there are any invoices stuck within the interface and the reason they are stuck. Please be aware, if there is more than 1 page of errors, you will need to click on the View Full File button
Error Codes
NOTE: The Interface will only show one error per record at any given moment. It is possible you can fix one error only to have a different one appear the next time the interface is run. If errors cannot be fixed by the user a copy of the Error report shown above must be sent to IT.Help@brighterplaces.co.uk
Invalid Project or Activity Code Errors
There are three possible reasons for this error. To find out which reason is causing the error, you will need to contact the current OpenAccounts Administrator (OA Admin). You will need to provide them with the Property Address and Property Sequence Number that the job relates to, along with the Activity Code (i.e. 18-2554-00) that is being reported as invalid.
- The Property and Activity Code are a valid combination but haven’t been setup within OA. The OA Admin will set this up and the invoice should pass across in the next interface run.
- The Property and Activity Code are not a valid combination. In this case the type of expense will need to be updated to ensure that it is a valid combination.
- The Activity code does not exist in OA. This is caused when an Expense Code in OH has been setup with an invalid Activity Code. The Database & IT Systems Analyst will need to correct the Activity Code setup within the Expense Code. Any jobs that have been raised with that expense code will have to have the same expense code reassigned to it to correct the coding in the background. If invoices have already been authorised for payment, the OA Admin will need to agree a course of action with the Head of Finance. Either the invoices concerned will need to be deleted from Enterprise Housing & OA and re-entered via eBIS or a plan put in place to temporarily allow the Property\Activity Code combination, get the costs journalled to the correct Activity code and then suspend the Property\Activity Code combination.
No Project Code Found for Job Errors
In these cases, an error has occurred when setting up the job. This means the codes required by OpenAccounts are not showing correctly. Usually the Project code is missing. In order to resolve these errors:
- Select Repairs\Repair Selection from the Home screen in Enterprise Housing
- Find the repair by putting the Job Number into the search box and select
Highlight the job entry and select 
to find the missing information
- You will need the two pieces of information highlighted below to enable you to create the missing code:
Project Codes in OA follow a strict convention, depending on the property type. This is:
- C-B-12345 for a Block
- C-P-12345 for a Property
Where 
denotes the B or P entry, and Property Sequence Number (appears 
on screen) denotes the numbers entry. Use these to build your code.
Return to the repairs screen and select 
and 
to go to the correct screen. The 
field will show the code attached to the job
- In the
field, type the correction WITHOUT a space between the codes
Select 
to save the correction.
- You can check in the Job Details on the Financial Tab, where the correction will appear WITH a space between the codes
OA Area Not Defined For Property User Code Errors
These errors mean there is an issue with the Property set up in Enterprise Housing. Contact the current EH System Administrator for assistance
Outstanding Invoices Report – Submitted to Client
The Repairs team regularly run an Outstanding Invoices Report which details any repairs invoices that have not yet been passed for payment and what phase of the authorisation process they are at.
Occasionally, invoices may present in this report with a status of Submitted to Client. This could be caused by one of the following reasons;
- The invoice(s) were processed after the OH to OA Interface has run (8pm), but before the IMS DataMart refresh (midnight). These invoices should pass through the interface on the next run, please re-check the report in 24 hours.
- If Invoices remain at the status Submitted to Client for multiple days, then this is likely due to a configuration issue within the contract they have been raised against. The OH Admin will need to check the Days to Enter Practical Completion and Days for Auto-Payment settings within the Contract Maintenance | Modify Contract Finance Details screen. The processing date for these invoices can also be changed manually by going to;
-
Responsive Repairs > Processing > Review Contractor Claims, changing the Contractor Reviews to After Invoicing and filtering for the contract with the held invoices.
