Objective and Scope

The object of this procedure is to describe the flow of the bank data update and how is formed the european bank accounts. 

General Principles

The suppliers must be required to send their bank data for payment to SBS directly. There are 2 ways to request the update of this data: through the tool Vendor Workflow Request (SAP system) or by sending an email to the Paymentsecurityprocess@solvay.com (Freshdesk ticket).

Buyers (and accountants) are authorised to send bank statements to this electronic mailbox, when they receive documents from suppliers directly. SBS will then perform a check directly to the supplier. 

Bank details are exclusively maintained in the system where the client level of vendors is maintained. 

IBAN structure

IBAN stands for International Bank Account Number.

It is the Bank codification used for the international payments in Occidental Europe. This codification is using the ISO code of the country, a 2 characters check digit and the bank account identification. Detailed structure and validation rules are depending on each country. All information concerning IBAN (rules, structure, list of countries concerned, etc) can be found on the IBAN site https://www.iban.com .

IBAN code is mandatory for all the trans-border payments in the Western Europe countries which have set up a management of IBAN codes. These payments are generally made via Solvay CICC. 

An IBAN consists of a two-digit country code, two check digits, and a Basic Bank Account Number (BBAN) that contains specific bank and account details. Each country is responsible for its own BBAN structure and SWIFT is the official registrar of the national IBAN formats. Example:

Countries without IBAN 

For the countries without IBAN the bank data is inserted column by column and the operator needs to confirm the Bank Key. The Bank Key is different depending on the country.

When not provided by the requester it can be used the SWIFT code.

• MORROCO
  The country has IBAN but the validation is not possible. Insert the bank data without it like this example:
  
  
  
  Bank country + Bank Key (variable size) + Bank account (14 numbers) + AK (2 numbers).

NOTE: Regarding US bank details, the bank key used is the one marked with ACH in the document. Example:

Bank data maintenance

The requester of a bank account update can be anyone from the SOLVAY company or the supplier. He is responsible for the content of the request.

His role consist in:

• Collecting information and evidence;
• If available, the physical evidence must be attached.

Request tools

Vendor Workflow Request

The update of the bank data can be triggered by the buyer (through the vendor creation request) or by the DATA team (through a vendor modification request) using the Vendor Workflow Request.

NOTE: not applicable for group companies, alternative payee suppliers and requests originated in CICC.

Concerning the DATA team the Vendor option on the Vendor Workflow is - Request bank data (PF1_050). The transaction is Z1S_VWF_REQUEST:

Fill in the tab Web form the "Vendor contact name", "Vendor contact e-mail" and "E-mail language" and then the company 5960. SAVE the update .

NOTE: If the segment code is not filled in is not possible to proceed with the Vendor Workflow. The GPS team needs to be contacted to update this field and a Freshdesk ticket should be sent to PTP HD team requesting an outbound.

The vendor is called to fill a file with the bank details. Two automatic emails will be sent to supplier:   

• Mail with the link to webform:

• Mail with the pin code:

The outbound performed by the Contact Center team is not needed in this situations.

Freshdesk ticket

The update of the bank data can be also triggered by the buyer, from a SBS team colleague or from the Data team using the Freshdesk ticketing tool.

The ticket can be generated by sending an email (to ptp-data.analysis@support.solvay.com or payment.securityprocess@support.solvay.com) or creating directly on the tool.

The vendors team will see this tickets inside the Group D&A EMEA (PTP Process: Data &amp Analysis ;  PTP-Subprocess: Vendor Master Data).

Request from Buyer/Accountant/ Other SBS team with suppliers document.

DATA role:

• Check veracity of the request, if is being sent from a reliable e-mail ID (if not reliable inform your team leader);
• Confirm the vendors number by matching the 3 following parameters: VAT ID, vendor name and vendor address (if the VAT is incorrect the request must be returned to the requester);
• Analyse recent tickets;
• Check the document or the need of a SBI (standard bank info). It is needed when:
  • The bank details are not provided; 
  • When the information received does not allow to confirm the number of the vendor (no Name, Address nor VAT provided).
• Check possible bank data duplication (SQ00 transaction);
• Inform the buyer/accountant of the next step (outbound);
• Provide a print of the contacts (master data plus official web page).

Standard message:

"Hello,

Could you, please, contact supplier XXX and confirm the bank details on the invoice/ and request a SBI?

Master data contacts: image

Official webpage contacts: image

Thank you in advance

(DATA notes: VWF XXX created and possible account duplication analysed)"

The ticket is sent to the GCC (when requested by a local the outbound is performed internally -  Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, English, French) requesting the outbound and a SBI if needed (standard bank info). 

The GCC will call and if no success an email will be sent. If necessary there will be a second outbound (2 days) and a third (last contact - 3 days).

• If the outbound was not achieved at the end of the attempts DATA team will proceed according to whether or not there is a bank account on the invoice. 
  • If not, then the team will check if a bank account already exists in the vendors master data. 
    • If not, new contacts must be requested to the locals explaining that we have done all the attempts without success and that we will wait until supplier complaints about the payment. 
    • If yes, these bank accounts must be used.
  • If yes, then the team will check if a bank account already exists in the vendors master data.
    • If not, the update will be performed and an email will be sent to the requester and to the Panel manager informing of the incident: "Vendor XXX has been updated with bank details, as in attached document, without succeeding in an outbound validation with the supplier."
      NOTE 1: If the invoice mention more then one bank account it should be inserted the first bank account.
      NOTE 2: If the invoice mention one bank account per currency it should be inserted the bank account correspondent to the currency of the invoice.
      
      
    • If yes, the team will check if they are for the same currency.
      • If yes, it will be used the one already in the system;
      • If not, the update will be performed and an email will be sent to the requester and to the Panel manager informing of the incident: "Vendor XXX has been updated with bank details, as in attached document, without succeeding in an outbound validation with the supplier. The Outbound process consist in our Contact Center contacts by e-mail or Phone number (from Vendor Master Data) and request supplier to provide Bank details, when not available or to confirm the Bank Data when available. Contact Center will perform 2 attempts to obtain the information from the supplier, during a total of 6 working days. "
• If the outbound was achieved then the update can be performed. A new check of bank data duplication should be performed.

In the situation where the confirmed account is different from that given to us in the initial order, a new outbound should be performed to clarify the situation.

When confirmed more than one bank account all new accounts must be updated.

GCC role:

• Perform the outbound (to ask for the bank account which must be used for the payment);
• Request a SBI when needed;
• Provide the Name and Phone number used for the contact;
• Not send the supplier any bank account information;
• Advise to correct the invoice image when the bank account confirmed doesn’t match with the one on the invoice;
• If new contacts are obtained to reach the supplier, then GCC will re-start the outbound attempts;
• If other bank accounts have been previously recorded in the vendors bank details, GCC asks which ones are still actives or can be removed.
• If there are more than one bank account on the invoice (or on another document), GCC asks the vendor which ones have to be recorded in our database;
• Assign the ticket to the DATA team.

The Data team will reply to the Buyer/Accountant informing of the update. If requested by other SBS team it must be passed to the correspondent Agent and Group.

Block M tickets concerning WP1 vendors, when concluded the update the ticket is passed to PtP HD team with the tag "WP1_BLOCKM".

Request from Buyer/Accountant/ Other SBS team without suppliers document.

A request of bank data update without document oblige the request of a SBI (document with the suppliers Name, Address, VAT ID and bank account). When received the data controller will need to check if the Name, address and VAT match with information on the vendors master data.

The roles of the Data and GCC teams remain the same.

Request from Supplier

When received bank details directly from the supplier the update can be performed. In this situations the extension of the email received must match with the extension of the email available in the vendors master data. If not an outbound is required.

In cases where it is not possible to identify the vendor number the Data controller must send the ticket to the GCC team requesting to start an outbound to confirm the suppliers Purchase Order number.

The roles of the Data and GCC teams remain the same.

Bank data update

All manual changes must be must be justified using the field Comments (tab Address). Example: T 4695591 (Freshdesk ticket) or VWF 470615 (Workflow Request).

The bank data can be inserted in two different ways: column by column or using the button "IBAN Maintained"  :

• Column by column - used when the country do not have an IBAN:

It is inserted the Country of the Bank account, then the Bank key (for RU is called BIK), The Account holder (when applicable), then the bank account, the Account Key (when applicable) and the Bank Type.

• Inserting the IBAN (by clicking in the field ) :

• Bank type: it is mandatory, even if the vendors has only one bank.

The standard codification is 4 characters alphanumeric with specific meaning: EUR1, CNY2, USD3…

For multi-currency, the correct format should be: ZZZ1

When a new bank account is added or updated it should be assigned the Partner Bank Type number 1 of the list, i.e. becomes EUR1 or GBP1 or USD1 etct, changing also the available ones with the subsequent numbers (EUR1 will be EUR2 ...)

This change will allow the payment of invoice to the most accurate Bank Account and a more efficient Automation on the Automatic Postings.

Bank key

Bank key = unique identification code of a bank in a country. 

This field is maintained in the PF1_050. Key users located in countries using a non latin alphabet are authorised to enter the local version of name and address in their own alphabet (Cyrillic, Chinese, Kanji, Thaï, …). 

The transactions used to maintain the bank data file:

During the introduction of a bank account in the vendors master data the system can request the Bank Key. If not yet created you should leave the vendor and go to the FI01 to create it. 

It is mandatory to have the following fields when processing this task:

• Bank Name (Name of the bank);
• Bank Number (Bank identification used in the IBAN codification);

• SWIFT Code (International bank code that identifies particular banks worldwide. It’s also known as a Bank Identifier Code (BIC) - consists of 8 or 11 characters).

Format: Bank code (4) + Country Code (2) + Location code (2) + Branch code (optional + 3). 

The code must be confirmed using the website - https://www2.swift.com/bsl/index.faces .

NOTE 1: A Bank key cannot have symbols - example : BG BFTBBGSF$01.

NOTE 2: When not confirmed the 3 numbers of the branch is not allowed the introduction of 3 Xs - example : AT 18130 (swift BWFBATW1XXX).

Bank data duplication

To check if a bank account required in a request is not already assigned to another third party (to avoid that a fraudulent bank account would be assigned to several third parties) it is used the transaction SQ00.

The search of existing bank account is done by the data controller through a query in PRS (ZZ-VEN-BNK-ACC).

If the query displays one or several third parties with the required bank account, the Data controller determines if the situation can be accepted or not, according to data management rules.

It can be accepted when confirmed that the companies belong to the same group.

It can't be accepted when it's not possible to determine relation between vendors. In this situation the a Freshdesk ticket needs to be created to the GCC team asked to contact supplier to confirm relation between "different" vendors for a local to request more info.

Bank data deletion

Erasing an existing bank account may be done under conditions:

• • the supplier mentions explicitly that the existing bank account is obsolete and replaced by a new one,
  • the supplier explicitly ensures that, in case of pending payments, an agreement exists with its bank for an automatic refund from the old bank account to the new one,

Erasing a bank account is usually performed by SBS upon receiving this information from the supplier, including after confirmation of a new bank account.

When vendors are marked for deletion, their bank details must be removed.

Particular situations

The general procedure may be adapted to particular situations where the update of the bank account must be done quickly.

Bankruptcy

The bankruptcy cases should be confirm with one of the below contacts from the CC Legal Team, depending on the country (Responsible for EMEA: Michael Van Der Horst). 

Contacts:

• Germany: Martina SCHOE (N+1: Wolfgang Müller)
• Italy: Roberta GOZZINI (N+1s: Marco Bagnoli)
• Spain: Belen Fernandez CORRALES (N+1: Jose Marcos Carrera Gomez)
• United Kingdom: Deborrah ROWDEN (N+1: Melvin Dawes)
• Belgium: Greit de PESTEL

• France: Martine CHEVALIER

  
  

Reference "BANKRUPTCY" should be added in "Ref. Details" field when updating a bank account which belongs to a Lawyer, Fiscal Entity, etc which is authorized to receive the payments on behalf of a specific supplier with financial issues (the same is applied in case of use of a permitted payee). All the old bank details must be removed from the vendors master data. The question if the supplier should be blocked must be done to the requester and all the necessary actions must be taken depending on the answer.

• AP Procedure - Bankruptcy, Garnishement or black list

Chartering / Shipping (maritime freighting)

A Chartering/Shipping vendor can be identified through the field Search Term 2 on vendors master data:

And by the Segment code P052 LO-SEA CHARTERING:

Suppliers for chartering/shipping are asked to send their SBI to SBS D&A BO (PaymentSecurityProcess@solvay.com).

Vendor Workflow requests for new suppliers mentioning “chartering” or "shipping" in the Communication area with a copy of the SBI attached, requires the creation of a Freshdesk ticket.

An email will be sent to one of the logistics managers requesting approval for this update:

The confirmation has to be given by a different person than the initial requester (even if the requester is a Logistic Manager) and has to mention the workflow request in the "subject" field.

• • Logistic Managers:

No need to perform any direct outbound with the vendor.

Correction of Bank Key

• Letters or e-mails received from our bank, informing us about a change of a bank key account belonging to a vendor, are sufficient proofs to proceed with the change without additional controls. The proof should be attached in the request:
  

Factoring/ Permitted Payee

Factoring is a financial transaction and a type of debtor finance in which a business sells its accounts receivable (i.e., invoices) to a third party (called a factor).

In this situations the bank account of the factoring company is inserted in the master data of the SOLVAY supplier (upon confirmation of the account by the supplier - standard outbound). It is added a reference on the fields Account Holder and Reference details:

In some cases the bank account of the factoring may be already in the field Permitted payee. In this cases it must be inserted in the SOLVAY supplier (with the account holder and reference details).

NOTE 1: Applicable to all new vendors as of 01.01.2017 (link between commercial vendor and factoring account is no longer performed using the field Permitted Payee). 

Intragroup

For PF1 and WP1 companies it has to be checked if the bank account exists in:

• CICC online -  http://solia.solvay.com/irj/portal/Services/CICCOnline_AboutUs or/and  CICC bank accounts
• Nafta online -  http://solia.solvay.com/irj/portal/Services/NaftaOnline_AboutUs

If the required bank details match the data in the online data, then the bank details can be inserted without further confirmation. 

If not, it must be approved by the Company Accounting Manager concerned. Therefore, there is no soft outbound in such cases.

Italian invoices

Bank accounts mentioned in Italian invoices with this layout do not need to be confirmed by the supplier (through a Contact Center outbound). 

This type of invoices are analysed by the Italian government.

Miscellaneous vendors

The vendors classified as ZZCD (miscellaneous creditors) have different bank update flows depending on the type of vendor:

• Associations, Donations, Quotations, Compensations and others, the bank data confirmation can be performed through the workflow creation or through ticket.
  • If no bank account provided via VWF at vendor creation time - No outbound will be performed;
  • If bank account provided via VWF at vendor creation time - Standard Outbound (3 attempts) is applied by Data Operations Vendors Team;
  • If the request to update the bank account comes via Freshdesk Ticket - Standard Outbound (3 attempts) is applied by Data Operations Vendors Team;
• Governmental, Institutions or similar the bank data can be inserted without vendor confirmation.
  • Through VWF at vendor creation time (an invoice or any other document needs to be attached to the request) and the bank data provided - Bank account can be added;
  • Through a Freshdesk ticket sent by a SOLVAY user (an invoice or any other document needs to be sent) and the bank data provided - Bank account can be added;
  • Through an email from the supplier or following a Block M ticket:
  •  If bank account is provided - CAM needs to be contacted in order to confirm the need to insert and pay the invoice.

NOTE 1: For French ZZCDs it is contacted the Controller and not the CAM. The site of the invoice must be confirmed to find the correct Controller.

This email must be sent:

"Dear Company Accounting Manager or Company Controller,

We have received a request to proceed with the Update of Bank Account for the Miscellaneous Creditor 99xxxxxx  - NAME, for the Company Code yyyy for which you are assigned as an approver on the Miscellaneous Creditor tool.

Taking this into consideration we would like to obtain your confirmation to proceed with this update in order to do not delay the payment. 

Please be informed that no update will be made until your confirmation is obtained."

NOTE 2:  No change is done until confirmation is obtained. After two days a follow up should be done and then the ticket can be closed (it will reopen if needed).

• If no bank account provided - Request bank info to the responsible for the vendor creation (buyer) and can be inserted.

If detected that the bank account already exists in an equal but standard vendor it can be inserted whenever these conditions exist:

• Contacts are the same;

• the account was recently updated;

• the invoice contains the bank account.

The same rule applies when the bank account is missing in the standard vendor but is available in the ZZCD version.

New outbound procedure

Situations where it is not possible to confirm the bank account directly with the supplier and after all attempts have been made Data Operations Vendors Team can proceed with the bank data update if available in the invoice image, if one of these two scenarios presents:

• the supplier do not have any bank account in the data base;
• bank accounts available in the vendors data base have different currencies;
• the bank account available in the system already originated a refund. In this case the bank account must be replaced by the new one.
  
  

The update must be reported to the local responsible for the vendor creation (Buyer; VWF requester; PO requisitioner) with the following data:

"Just to inform you that vendor #### has been updated with bank details, as in the attached document, without succeeding in an outbound validation with the supplier."

Oficial suppliers website

If the supplier's bank account is available on the supplier's official page and is the same as the one in the invoice, we can insert the account in the system without outbound.

Poland Bank accounts

The PL bank accounts update from PL vendors can be performed without outbound if confirmed the bank details on the government website: https://www.podatki.gov.pl/wykaz-podatnikow-vat-wyszukiwarka .

By inserting the VAT ID (without the country code - NIP) it is checked the suppliers Name and the Bank details:

It can also be searched using the bank account:

In case of discrepancies:

• If Bank account is confirmed by the website but not appear in the "Numbers of settlement accounts or personal invoices" it can be inserted; 
• If Bank account cannot be confirmed through the site the Freshsdesk ticket must be sent to PtP HD RIGA team. They will clarify with the supplier why the information is missing in the government site and will inform that we will not be able to add their bank account due to Polish legislation.
• If VAT cannot be confirmed through the site the operator will need to contact the site buyer:
  • If the exception is confirmed the Freshdesk ticket must be sent to PtP HD RIGA team in order to be perform a regular outbound and the vendor should be added to the exception list or if the bank account was previously deleted (in the last 18 months) and matches with the invoice, it can be reinserted without outbound.
  • If the exception is not confirmed and no explanation is given the Freshdesk ticket is passed to PtP HD RIGA  and they will inform that we will not be able to add their bank account due to Polish legislation.
  • If the exception is not confirmed but an explanation is provided the Freshdesk ticket must be sent to PtP HD RIGA team in order to be perform a regular outbound or if the bank account was previously deleted (in the last 18 months) and matches with the invoice, it can be reinserted without outbound.

Example of a message to the buyer:

"The Polish law obliges the suppliers to maintain their bank details on the Governmental Website Gov.pl (white list), but there are some exceptions:

1. self-employed workers and (very) small entities.

2. invoices below 15 k PLN (gross amount).

As Vendor ##### NAME THE VENDOR doesn't have bank account information available on the White List we need to confirm if this vendor is under any of the above-described exceptions.

Are you able to provide us this information?"

NOTE 1: in case no buyer is found for the companies 6268 and 7531 you can contact Pawel Koziorowicz.

NOTE 2: When the following message is returned by the site we can insert the bank account: "The account number searched for is consistent with the pattern used and matches one of the accounts displayed on the list".

NOTE 3: If a bank account is already available in the suppliers master data, no further confirmation is necessary (even if the bank account in the invoice doesn't match with the one in SAP). No Block M requests should be created in those cases.

Re-introduction of a previously bank account that was removed after data cleaning

Bank accounts removed as a consequence of a data cleaning can be re-introduced when there is a request stating that this account is still valid (up to a maximum of 2 years of the bank account removal).

Rusvinyl exception

D&A accepts all bank account requests sent by Rusvinyl colleagues for All suppliers (all countries). They can be received through ticketing tool or through the Workflow Request tool.

All Bank Data from Rusvinyl colleagues will be maintained by Data controllers and approved by Rusvinyl colleagues (in case of duplication scenario). Data team analyses the request to confirm that no duplication exists and all required information was inserted. No outbound procedure will be followed.

Treasury Suppliers

If received a request to change the bank data for one of the below vendors, the normal outbound procedure should be skipped and the Treasury Team should be contacted:

Treasury users list:

• François Paulus

• Ana Cunha

• Larissa Duval

Useful information

• Bank data websites
  • IBANs

http://www.ecbs.org/iban.htm

http://www.iban-rechner.de/

https://bank.codes/iban/generate/

• • Currencies

http://fxtop.com/en/countries-currencies.php

• • SWIFT

https://www2.swift.com/bsl/index.faces

• • Azerbaijan

https://bank-code.net/iban/structure/azerbaijan-international-bank-account-number

• • Morrocos
    

https://www.westernunion.com/dk/en/banks-of-morocco-details.html

• Logistic managers list:

• LPRs and Panel Managers:

LPR: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/17c-tc2yRUjd9zZ5-owO-PBrBqeWpBzJI7pU7hWnD0Rw/edit?ts=560e4e5e#gid=924946904 

Panel Managers: https://sites.google.com/a/solvay.com/sbs-procure-to-pay-portal/table-of-approval---master-data-vendor-management

• SE16:

BNKA: Bank Keys

LFBK: Vendors by Bank account

Attachments

Basf Fl

Outbound Flow

Polish Flow