E-foods Online - Application Overview

Introduction to e-foods online

e-foods online is an e–procurement sales/purchasing application that e-foods offer to national companies operating in the food service industry.

The system is comprised of a number of subsystems that collectively provide the complete spectrum of sales and purchasing business systems procedures.

The system operates on large application servers based at a co-location centre in Manchester. These systems allow any number of authorised users to logon to the system from anywhere in the world via the internet to conduct their e-business activities. This multi-user feature is of particular importance when processing through the many    peak trading periods that occur in the food service industry.

e-foods are able to offer a customisation service to enable e-foods online to form the basis of original and bespoke systems to suit the specific circumstances of any particular situation.

e-foods supply the system in two ways

1.) Use e-foods current supply base of over a 100 local suppliers across a wide product range from fresh produce to frozen, dried good and local speciality producers e.g bread suppliers, all at national agreed prices.

2.) e-foods supply the system on it own therefore allowing our customers to use their current suppliers and negotiate their own prices.  e-foods provide full management and training on the system from site ordering to account management.

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Purchasing management benefits

The e-foods online system enables the purchasing team access to live data 24/7/365, providing them with the tools to see 100% real time information.  This enables customers to act promptly to any purchasing mishaps by chefs; the system also provides true monthly statistical reports for the finance team.

The head office can instantly view what a site in Leeds/London is ordering in real time, allowing complete control of purchasing.

Financial Benefits

e-foods online e-procurement system provides real time data 24/7/365 allowing finance directors to see live info on spend trends per site and as a group.
Having access to key financials data and reports is critical to your success.
Real-time financial data enables faster, smarter business decisions. Our solutions incorporate all the necessary tools to successfully manage your business food purchases. 
Real-time visibility of all financial data is the key to successfully managing any organization.
Today’s businesses don't have ready access to all information that affects their day to day operations. Instead they rely solely on information available in their finance system which is often out of date.

Chef / Cooks Benefits

The easy to use system allows chefs to place multiple orders with a number of suppliers. Orders can be saved and adding to through out the day also the chef can set up standing orders, favorites, view past orders and place weekly stock on line. Chefs can instantly view weekly spend and product with a click of a button. The system can also enable suppliers to offer daily specials online.    

Recipe Cost Calculator

As part of our implementation the system will have a recipe cost calculator. The chef will be able to list the ingredients and quantities of a dish. The system will then interrogate supplier price lists and will cost the dish on prevailing product prices.

 

Product price controls and ordering

Each user login is unique.

The e-foods system ensures total control via head office over all prices and products purchased.

The system controls all products and prices via head office ensuring total control of the whole product list ensuring the chef only buys products from the nominated supplier at the agreed price.

In the past it has been too easy for the chef / cook to buy products from non nominated suppliers paying up to 30% more for the product the e-foods system eliminates this problem giving the head office total control over all purchasing.

Chef’s can place orders any time 24/7/365 from any location.

The system identifies the price list and product set associated with the customer concerned. Facilities are available to restrict the product set available to certain customers site should it be needed.

All products and customers are allocated to specific distributors ensuring 100% control over purchasing.

From this structure each customer can see the range of products that are available for order and from which distributor.  e-foods online will create as many parts of the order as there are suppliers for the products concerned.
This allows the chef / cook to order from any product range at the same time, the system identifies the supplier via our unique coding system saving the chef valuable time when placing their order.
Products can be added at any time for special function and then removed when they are not needed.

Each supplier/distributor has access to the system and can see their part of each customer order. Customers of course can see their whole order and at what stage in the delivery process, each part of the order is in, e.g. Picked, Despatched, and Invoiced etc.
An easy to follow traffic light system allows the chef to track their order from start to Finish.

 

Provided that Customers have an Internet connection and an external email address, orders can be placed to their suppliers from anywhere in the world.  Access to the system can be via a PC, Laptop or Personal Digital Assistant (PDA).

Facilities exist for the customer to create standing orders, i.e., 30 pints of milk semi every Monday and Thursday 15 boxes of par fried chips on Tuesday and Friday and until the standing order is amended or deleted, e-foods will automatically create an order containing the products and quantities specified by the customer.

Alternatively, order templates can be created for each day upon which deliveries are needed these templates are then the 'skeleton reminders' from which the actual order is created. These templates are sectioned by product group and type e.g. Fresh Vegetables, Fresh Fruit, Frozen Meat, Customer Favourites etc. Distributors can nominate products as promotional items which also appear in a separate section, during Orders Entry.

In the event of a customers' broadband' connection being unavailable, facilities are available for Distributors to enter orders on behalf of the customer concerned.

 

Picking & Despatching

Distributors options exist to print product requirement lists, picking notes and delivery notes. In addition to this customers can print copies of delivery notes and track their orders through the various stages of the system i.e. picked, despatched, invoiced etc.

Invoicing & Statements

In addition to electronic invoicing the system will generate invoices to the head office of a contract detailing the sales transactions for the week or month (depending on whether the contract is invoiced weekly or monthly) ordered by delivery unit, date, supplier, product type.

These invoices are emailed to the customer, available for printing by the customer from the website and can be downloaded in data only format for integration with third party computer systems.

Sales Ledger Enquiries

Customers are given access to their Sales Ledger account via the e-food system. This process allows a customer to view the unpaid items on their account, view the details of a Sales Ledger transaction, print a copy invoice, print a copy delivery note and print a Sales Ledger statement. These documents are available in printable PDF format, or down loadable in data only format for entry to a spreadsheet or other computer system

Statistics

e-foods has product statistics available to the customer. This statistics program allows a chef to view the product volumes and values of all products bought last month with a comparison to the same period last year.

A head office can view the same statistics as detailed above but also have the option of printing the same statistics report for all delivery units for which the head
Office is responsible for.

The Paper trail

Historically national companies have been inundated with paper invoices, by using the e-foods online System the vast amount of paperwork involved with ordering and purchasing goods is immediately reduced improving efficiency and cutting administration costs and is kinder to our planet.

Online Transaction History

Each transaction is electronically logged, providing a history and complete audit trail, which can be analysed via the internet for, spend patterns, seasonal trends and gives you the opportunity to assess and standardise your products and supplier base.

On Site Training

The e-foods on-line System has been designed to be user friendly, and has been designed and developed with the input of our customer and suppliers. It is quick to learn, which is important because new and relief staff need to be able to pick it up easily. A computer in the kitchen for ordering produce online can be quite a cultural shock, but once mastered the benefits far outweigh that initial learning curve.

Depending on the amount of sites going live on the system at any one time series of one-day training workshops take place offsite for managers, deputy managers and chefs. This is followed up by a visit to each of the sites, back in familiar surroundings any further questions can be raised, and support can be given to help set up specific ordering  requirements to suit the way that individual works.  A  24/7 help line is available.

Integration

e-foods online has been designed from the outset to integrate with other computer systems.

All business documentation can be received by or sent from the system using industry standard formats to your own computer systems (EDI, electronic data interchange).

Currently the supported business documents are

Purchase Orders
Order Acknowledgements
Order Confirmations
Dispatch Notes
Sales Invoices
Remittance Advices

In the following message formats

• CSV
• Tradacomms
• XML

Using any of the following transmission methods:

• SSH
• SCP
• FTP
• SFTP
• FTPS
• AS2

 

The application itself is using the following technology 

• Linux
• Apache
• MySQL
• PHP
• Any Internet web browser

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Benefits of the system

1. Reduces paperwork for all parties
2. Cuts the cost of administration at head office
3. Minimises errors in ordering
4. Provides a comprehensive record of each transaction
5. Improves efficiency
6. Gives chefs and managers time to focus on other business activities
7. Provides purchase and fulfilment data which can be analysed for spend patterns and supplier performance
8. HQ has greater control over costs
9. Easy and quick to use
10. Easy to implement without incurring a huge investment in hardware
11. Provides a reliable online ordering system which is available 24/7/365
12. Greater flexibility - items can be added to the shopping basket at anytime
13. Secure network with full user audit trail
14. Hosted in the UK's primary internet access point in Manchester
15. Fully scalable system to meet customers demands
16. Facilitates growth strategies and operational change

 

The Managed Service has all the above features plus:

1. Dedicated account manager
2. Access to a complete national and local accredited supply network covering over 95% of your needs
3. Consultative advise for the purchase of 'Fresh' products
4. Monthly product and price bulletins and market trends
5. Bespoke product sourcing
6. First line support
7. Supplier management and liaison

 

Technical Information: Your Data Is Safe With Us

The e-foods system, like other national IT providers, is a secure service backed  up by the following

Physical Security and Safety

1. Servers kept in locked cage
2. Entry requires visual identity confirmation and five layers of biometric locks
3. Self-powered kinetic locks on server cabinet
4. 24/7/365 security, 24/7/365 video recording with 30-day retrieval
5. Controls for temperature, humidity and smoke/fire detection (compact zone dry pipe fire suppression)
6. Network Security
7. Multiple independent connections to Tier 1 Internet access providers (bandwidth is a BGP mix of Internap, Level3 and UUnet)
8. Uptime constantly monitored with instant downtime notification
9. Hardware & Security
10. Entire facility on UPS
11. 2 layers of diesel generators
12. Data is on RAID 10
13. Full redundancy for load balancers, application servers, database servers, and file servers
14. Software Security and Backups
15. Latest patches applied to all operating system and application files
16. SSL encryption of all billing data (and SSL for all project data on Premium and Plus-level accounts)
17. Data backed up every night to centralized backup system, with offsite backups in event of catastrophe

Trial and implementation of the system

Initially placing two units on trail would be the ideal situation, e-foods would train the chefs in the first instant away from the units to avoid any distractions, followed by in house training.  An e-foods staff member would stay in London for the first week to guide the chef through the ordering process, being on call 24/7, and working on site with the chefs. The same would apply to purchasing and accounts, e-foods would ensure all members of your team where fully trained to use the online system.
Rolling out the system to all additional units within London could be done at a rate of 10 per week; all other locations could be integrated over a four week period.  We currently have five staff trainers within our business; so would be able to provide the sites with all the necessary support during the roll out.   I would anticipate full training of your chefs and head office staff within six weeks.