November 5, 2024
The Finance department is excited to announce that we will be soft launching our new supplier management system, PaymentWorks, on November 5, 2024. We will soft launch with a single department and allow them to invite new suppliers first. The soft launch will allow us to gather feedback, monitor performance, and ensure that the user experience is the best it can be before we launch to the entire university community. Meanwhile, the Finance department will be working to convert all our active suppliers to the PaymentWorks system.
Once our soft launch is complete, we will roll out the system to the remainder of the campus community, over the next 60 – 90 days. Please continue to onboard suppliers using our existing process until you have received communication from the Finance department and instructions on how to utilize the new PaymentWorks system to onboard new suppliers.
Why are we moving to a new supplier management system?
Implementing this system will allow campus to invite their new suppliers without going through the University’s procurement system, BobcatBUY. The new system will also provide you visibility to the status of your new supplier enrollment status. In addition, if the supplier completes the enrollment process in a timely manner, it will result in a quicker turnaround time for supplier setup in the systems.
A major benefit is that university departments will no longer be tasked with collecting confidential information from their suppliers (ex., tax ID and bank account information). Registering with PaymentWorks allows suppliers to set up a profile and manage their account and make any changes to their information as needed. Suppliers will also be able to upload all necessary documents such as tax information, OPERS Independent Contractor Acknowledgement, and any required insurance documentation. Though not available in the initial release, the finance department is working through an integration that will allow suppliers to see their invoices, payment information, and history through their PaymentWorks profile. We will communicate more information on this once this is available to our suppliers.
Additionally, PaymentWorks will do all supplier verification tasks such as tax ID, addresses, and bank account information. They will also run all legally required supplier compliance checks against both Federal and State sanction lists and continually monitor our suppliers against those sanction lists throughout the life of the supplier partnership.
What does this mean for your existing suppliers?
Your department does not need to do anything with suppliers that are already active in the system. Active suppliers can continue to be used for all your purchasing needs. The Finance department will be reaching out to these suppliers over the next several months to get them into the new system.
If you have a supplier that needs to make changes to their supplier record, please submit an FCC ticket and Finance will escalate their PaymentWorks onboarding process so that we can get their information updated in the system.
How do I invite a supplier in PaymentWorks and follow up on their onboarding process?
The Finance department has launched a PaymentWorks website with work instructions for both the campus community and suppliers. Please visit our website at https://www.ohio.edu/finance/accounts-payable/supplier-management to familiarize yourself with the PaymentWorks system.
The Finance department will also be offering workshops to provide demonstrations on how to use the system and answer all your questions.
How do I know if my supplier has already been invited to register through PaymentWorks?
It’s easy – just use the supplier dashboard available in OBI. Two fields have been added to the dashboard which are titled “Last PW Update Date” and “Date Invitation Sent”. Below are descriptions on these fields.
- Date Invitation Sent – A date in this field indicates the day that the supplier was invited through PaymentWorks.
- If this field is blank, then no invitation has been sent to this supplier to onboard through PaymentWorks.
- Last PW Update Date – A date in this field indicates that the supplier has submitted their NVR, and it has been approved by the Finance department. This means that your supplier is fully onboarded through PaymentWorks. This date will be updated if the supplier makes changes to their supplier profile.
- If this field is blank, the supplier has not completed their NVR, or they have completed the NVR, but it has not yet completed back-office approvals. If you have invited a supplier, please log into PaymentWorks and review the tracker to see where the NVR is in the process.
If there is a date in the “Date Invitation Sent” field, but the “Last PW Update Date” field is blank, that means that your supplier has not been fully onboarded to PaymentWorks. The supplier will receive automated reminders about the invitation on day 3, 7, 14, 21, 28, and 35 after the invitation is sent if no action is taken by the supplier. After the 35 days, the invitation may be resent by the initiator, if needed. Departments will need to work with their suppliers to make sure they submit their NVR prior to receiving any good or service.
Prior PaymentWorks Communication
The Finance department has released several PaymentWorks articles in Business Matters throughout the implementation process to familiarize the university community with the system. Below are links to those articles.
- New Supplier Management System (PaymentWorks)
- Inviting a Supplier in PaymentWorks
- PaymentWorks: Tracking the Vendor through the Vendor Registration
- PaymentWorks Update – September 2023
- PaymentWorks: Vendor Registration
As always, if you have any questions, please submit a FCC ticket.