Energy Bureau Service – Utility bill validation and Cost Recovery

Outsourcing your utility bill processing and validation to the TEAM Bureau will help you considerably reduce administration costs and save on average between 2 and 3.5% of your total annual energy costs.

The TEAM Bureau service can provide:

• Utility Bill Validation and Cost Recovery Service
• Data Collection and Management
• Energy Management Reporting
• Tenant Billing
• Project Management

Utility Bill Validation and Cost Recovery Service

All bills are checked and where appropriate, overcharges are recovered from your utility company. You are kept informed of all activity, for example; which invoices need to be paid, which are being withheld and which are in dispute. In 2011, 50% of our customers found that the cost recovered through effective bill validation exceeded the cost of the Bureau Service.

Data Collection and Management

A review undertaken by HM Treasury estimated that moving from paper to electronic utility billing (Electronic Data Interchange or EDI) can save organisations £28 per invoice.

The TEAM Bureau collects utility data directly from your supplier and tracks the history of your energy consumption. All invoices are checked and entered onto the TEAM Bureau database. Data can be received in the format of paper bills, electronic bills (EDI) or as half-hourly data. Utility bills are scanned into electronic documents and can be sent to you in order to make the process completely ‘paperless’. TEAMs Bureau process manual meter reads, as well as paper bills and half hourly data.

Energy Management Reporting

Quality consumption data obtained through using the bureau service supports effective Monitoring and Targeting making further savings of 5 to 20% possible.

TEAM’s Energy Management reporting allows you to utilise the high frequency data available from both Half Hourly and AMR meters, and invoiced consumption.

Reporting can both identify and use benchmarking figures, create action alerts, assist in regression analysis and produce a large number of key reports highlighting under and over performing sites.

By focussing the reporting on energy consumption, companies can benefit from potentially lower energy usage and costs across their portfolio.

The types of energy report produced range from year on year cost and consumption to a weekly profile report.

Tenant Billing

TEAM's Tenant Billing Service helps organisations to accurately divide utility costs between tenants, cost centres or departments. It is ideal for organisations, who own or manage multiple or multi-let properties including residential housing, retail parks, ports, airports, service stations or industrial sites. This service is extremely flexible and can be adapted to individual requirements.

Project Management

Every TEAM Bureau customer has a dedicated Project Co-ordinator as a main point of contact supported by a service team responsible for delivering quality service you subscribe to.

The Project Co-ordinator will have an in-depth knowledge of your portfolio’s energy performance and will be able to advise you where savings can be made.

Regular update meetings ensure continuous improvement and customer satisfaction. Support from the TEAM Bureau is available during business hours throughout the year, with additional resources such as IT or Energy Consultants where required.

Simple Implementation Steps

Once the implementation process has started, TEAM Bureau will work on your behalf to ensure that all relevant information from invoices to half hourly data is directed to the correct place - whether that be straight to TEAM or to your own contacts. Clearly defined procedures will ensure this continues throughout the service, as TEAM utilise their supplier relationships to become the liaison point for utility queries on your behalf.

Savings and Benefits

Considerable savings can be achieved by using the TEAM Bureau service.

Energy management – 5 to 20% savings can be identified in your consumption through, effective Monitoring and Targeting.

Bill processing – A review undertaken by HM Treasury estimated that moving from paper to electronic utility billing (EDI) can save organisations £28 per invoice.

Bill Validation, Query Management and Cost Recoveries – Identifying billing errors can save on average 3.5% of your total energy costs. Prompt identification and management ensures that all errors are detected and savings are realised.

Project management – A service team lead by an experienced Project Co-ordinator will be assigned to assist with identifying potential energy savings and energy related projects.

Resource Allocation & Deployment – Freeing up resources within your organisation allows staff to concentrate on implementing energy saving measures.

Examples of Savings TEAM have achieved:

	Emergency Service: Savings Achieved 4% Return on TEAM Service Costs   3  times
	Central Government: Savings Achieved  7.3% Return on Service Costs >7 times
	Local Government: Savings Achieved  5.2% Return on TEAM Service Costs >7 times
	Educational Institution Savings Achieved  5.75% Return on TEAM Service Costs  >14 times
	Health Authority Savings Achieved  15.88% Return on TEAM Service Costs  >17 times
	Broadcast & Media Organisation Savings Achieved  5% Value  >£500,000 Return on TEAM Service Costs  3 times
	Property Management Organisation Savings Achieved  3% Return on TEAM Service Costs  >5 times

Access your data online

TEAM SigNet is the software which will provide access to your consumption and billing data 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and also allows you to track the achievements of the your Bureau service.

SigNet features a wide range of interactive reports allowing you to run reports yourself or, if you prefer, your Bureau service team can pre-schedule them to be despatched by email or stored on a dedicated area of SigNet for you to view at your convenience.

Signet has the following features:

•   M&T reports – presenting consumption, costs and emissions
•   Automated report production and distribution
•   24 hour secure access to your day plus one utility consumption data
•   Savings to date log

Financial Reporting

A range of finance and account related reports are available. Typical examples include, end of month forecast, budget v actual and detailed accounting reports for the accounts payable department. TEAM’s Accounts Link software allows electronic files to be dispatched from your utility supplier for direct input into your accounts payable system, thus avoiding manual input.

TEAM understand that customers use accounting systems in different ways for their own purposes. Therefore, TEAM will develop on a bespoke basis per customer, a unique accounting interface that will extract any relevant invoice data from your bills and create an input in the required format to upload to your accounting system, including Sage, Agresso, Microsoft Dynamics, SAP and many more.

Portfolio (Database) Management

For some businesses site ownership remains relatively static. However, for a large proportion of multi site operations, the acquisition and “moving on” of sites is commonplace. In these instances maintaining an accurate picture of a company’s portfolio is imperative and demands rigorous processes and a high level of attention to detail. With resource dedicated to the task of database management and documented processes produced from experience built from a diverse customer base, TEAM Bureau is able to facilitate this function for you.