Invoice Processing and Payment

This process relates to the procurement of goods and services following the Contracts Policy and procurement and contracts process. It begins with the creation of a Requisition which,  once approved, must be sourced to a Purchase Order. 

Most suppliers have been configured to receive Purchase Orders electronically to the email addresses associated with their supplier record, once the Purchase Order has been issued. In the event that a supplier has not been so configured, the Purchase Order issue option will read ‘Print’. In such cases, it will be the responsibility of the procurement agent to ensure that the Purchase Order document is provided to the supplier. 

Suppliers must email their invoices to po-invoices@georgetown.edu. All invoices must reference the relevant Purchase Order number. Failure by suppliers to deliver invoices directly to A/P with the necessary information may result in payment delays.Capital projects invoices and payment applications must be emailed to capitalaccountspayable@georgetown.edu

Purchase Order-backed invoices are processed in one of two ways:

1. Invoices from PunchOut and other strategic suppliers are processed via an integration between Georgetown’s ERP, Workday, and that of the supplier. Typically, such invoices require little manual intervention for their creation, though payment will only occur if the invoice is approved, matched, and the due-date has arrived.
2. Invoices from all other suppliers must be submitted to Accounts Payable as PDF files (preferably one file per invoice document) at po-invoices@georgetown.edu. These invoices are scanned, their data is extracted and interpreted by our invoice processing system, AppZen, and if any data elements are missing or if the system calculates a low confidence level, it routes to an Accounts Payable Analyst for manual review and processing
   
   Invoice documents that are clear, contain all required information, and reference the number of an issued, sufficiently funded Purchase Order tied to an active supplier are likely to be processed autonomously within 20-30 minutes of submission. Occasionally, such invoices may be flagged by the system for further review due to confidence levels of sub-100%. Any invoice flagged in this way that contains all of the required information will, in general, be processed within 3 business days.
   
   Invoice documents lack required information will require research and, often, intervention by procurement and financial personnel outside of the Office of Accounts Payable. The timing of processing and payment for invoices lacking essential information will be dependent on the timeliness of this intervention.

On occasion, the University may need to remit payments for expenses unrelated to procurement contracts or procards. The Supplier Invoice Request (MPREQ) process exists to facilitate such payments. The list that follows highlights some possible applications of the MPREQ process: 

• Non employee honorarium
• Prizes and awards
• Petty Cash replenishment
• Legal Services/ Settlement
• Event Officials
• Library Refunds

Georgetown’s Office of Accounts Payables settles payments on a daily basis for most payment methods. Settlement typically occurs between 8:30am and 10am every day. 

Invoices that are approved, are not in Match Exception, and have due-dates that have arrived (or will shortly arrive) are “ready to pay”. The invoice will pay out if it meets these conditions, the supplier’s record is active, and the supplier does not owe the University a balance greater than the amount of all ready to pay invoices (as indicated on the supplier record).

The small number of checks that are printed in-house (as opposed to those printed and mailed by our payment partner, Viewpost)  are only generated once per week, on Thursdays.