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Maredo is securing its position as Germany’s number-one steak restaurant chain thanks to efficient and well-flowing processes. The company has automated its incoming and outgoing document processes with ELO. The entire invoice release process is steered by ELO workflows. The result is effective and transparent processes.
With over 1700 employees in service, grill, kitchens and administration and a total of 60 restaurants (57 in Germany and 3 in Austria), Maredo Restaurants Holding is the number-one on the German steak restaurant market. It is also number two in the entire service restaurant sector and currently number 17 in the total German gastronomy sector. The group generated a net turnover in the 2005 fiscal year of some 99.4 million euro. Impressive figures for a company that is just as impressive. A wide range of services for the gastronomic sites rounds off the holding’s activities.
When the DĂĽsseldorf administration of Maredo Restaurant Holding decided to introduce an archiving and document management system in July 2003, the aims were relatively simple: structured storage of documents (focus on incoming and outgoing documents) and better findability of documents in general. In detail, the plan was to archive outgoing documents from an IBM AS/400 environment and process incoming documents via a complex workflow. This workflow contained components such as barcode recognition, depiction of a multi-level permissions hierarchy and a database link on the IBM AS/400 side. At the start of the project, the number of workplaces involved was estimated at 25. The company has now linked up 65 workplaces and realised internet access (ELO Internetgateway).
A key challenge in this project was archiving and further processing incoming invoices. The invoices were identified by barcode and then forwarded to an ELO workflow for internal processing. The unique aspect was depicting a multi-level permission procedure, which had to be implemented automatically depending on the invoice total. Up to a certain total, general staff can take care of invoices, and above that level the invoice has to be additionally authorised by the head of department. From hierarchy level 3, the senior management is also involved in the decision-making process. This requirement was realised with a combination of ELO standards (post-its) plus additional programming (workflow & permissions procedure) by the ELO Business Partner.
The number of ELO users at Maredo Restaurants Holding has now climbed to around 65 employees. Almost the entire administration section now works with the ELO DMS solution. The benefits for those integrated into the ELO concept are very significant. A considerable amount of documents are automatically archived and can be found again quickly and easily. For some time now, the wages office has been using the archiving options for wage slips and other relevant documents. The 1:1-depictability of the existing filing structure enabled a full depiction of the Maredo “wage files”. And ELO’s optimum structure no doubt also increased its acceptance in the company. Due to the re-structuring of naturally evolved work processes, the employees initially needed time to accept the workflow concepts. But it is now quite clear that the monitoring and escalation mechanisms created with ELO contribute to an improved overview and more efficient processing. The staff quickly got used to the ELO DMS system, and wouldn’t do without this option for optimised internal processes any more, comments Andreas Neumann (Head of IT and Organisation, DMS) from Maredo.
Maredo is not planning to extend the number of ELO workplaces in DĂĽsseldorf, but is currently focusing on comfortable email archiving. Additionally, the company plans to link further restaurants with the ELO DMS system in future, and is considering using Internetgateway and the workflow server.
"A large number of documents are automatically archived and can be found again quickly and easily. The 1:1-depictability of the existing filing structure certainly contributed to ELO’s acceptance." Andreas Neumann, Systems Manager
"The staff got used to the ELO DMS system very quickly and wouldn’t do without this option of optimised work processes any more." Andreas Neumann, Systems Manager
