Aer Lingus to implement Advanced Air Approvals apps to speed up procurement process

Irish airline issues iPads and iPhones to its senior executives who are on the go

Irish airline Aer Lingus is implementing Advanced Air Approvals, a suite of mobile apps from Advanced Business Solutions, to increase efficiency in its procurement process.

The company has been an Advanced customer for a number of years, using its core e5 financial management system, but the use of a mobile app will enable senior managers to approve or reject transactions from Apple and Android smartphone and tablet devices while they are on the move.

Aer Lingus processes 50,000 transactions each year such as requisitions, invoices and new supplier requests, and these will appear as a list in Advanced Air Approvals and can be categorised by type.

Authorised staff will be able to approve transactions even when they are offline, with the app holding transactions and e5 processing them when a network connection becomes available. An added function is for managers to attach notes if a transaction is rejected.

John Greene, head of data governance and enterprise reporting at Aer Lingus, told Computing that previously teams had to wait for senior executives to come back to the office for a final decision on procurement, and as they were frequently out of the office, this slowed down the overall process.

The integration with the organisation's finance system is managed through Advanced's cloud-hosted Air Administration gateway, which the vendor claims will enable the airline to restrict the app usage to specified users and monitor levels of activity to ensure that sensitive financial data is protected.

Greene added that the company is predominantly uses iPads and iPhones, which are provided for senior managers, but that some users have opted for Android devices.

"The fact that it works on both is important for us, and Advanced plans to make it available on Windows as well," he said.