17.1 Purpose of the Runbook
The Operations Runbook provides the step-by-step guide for running e-invoicing operations in steady state. It defines monitoring activities, incident handling, reconciliation, and escalation paths. This ensures Finance, IT, and Compliance teams operate seamlessly without dependence on ad hoc support.
Operations Cycle: Monitor → Detect → Respond → Resolve → Reconcile → Review
17.2 Daily Operations Checklist
Finance Team
- Review previous day's clearance report
- Address any rejected invoices (guided error messages provided)
- Confirm reconciliation counts between ERP, SmartAPI, and FIRS
IT Team
- Check SmartAPI dashboard for latency and error rates
- Verify ERP → SmartAPI → FIRS submission queue status
- Monitor certificate expiry alerts
Compliance Team
- Review evidence bundles uploaded to archive
- Confirm audit trail integrity (sample checks)
- Run daily compliance export for regulators if required
Deliverable: Signed Daily Operational Report stored in archive
17.3 Incident Management
Severity Classification
- Sev-1: Complete outage or clearance blockage Critical
- Sev-2: High error rate or major latency High
- Sev-3: Functional defect with limited scope Medium
- Sev-4: Cosmetic or informational issues Low
Response Actions
- Incident ticket raised automatically or by user
- Severity assigned and acknowledged within SLA target
- SmartAPI correlation ID used to trace and triage issue
- Resolution team engaged (Finance, IT, or Bluelight Ops)
- Post-mortem Root Cause Analysis (RCA) delivered within 5 business days for Sev-1/2
Incident Workflow: Detect → Ticket → Classify → Resolve → RCA → Close
17.4 Monitoring and Alerts
Dashboards
- Invoice clearance rate by company code, TIN, or product
- Top rejection reasons
- System health (CPU, memory, latency, throughput)
Alerts
- Finance: rejection > 5% in one day
- IT: latency breach (>1.5s P95) or queue backlog
- Compliance: evidence bundle mismatch or archive sync failure
Alerts are routed into ServiceNow, Jira, Teams, or client-preferred systems.
17.5 Reconciliation Procedures
Daily Reconciliation
- Compare ERP invoice counts vs SmartAPI counts vs FIRS receipts
- Exception queue automatically flagged for mismatches
- Finance resolves mismatches (e.g., resubmission of rejected invoices)
Intraday Spot Checks
- High-value invoices reconciled immediately on clearance
- Random audits run every 4 hours during business day
Monthly Sign-off: Finance and Compliance issue a signed reconciliation report archived for 10 years.
Reconciliation Loop: ERP → SmartAPI → FIRS → Exception Queue → Report
17.6 Escalation Matrix
| Level | Team | Responsibility |
|---|---|---|
| Level 1 (Ops) | Client IT and Finance analysts | Ticket creation |
| Level 2 (Integration) | Softrust engineers | ERP mapping or SmartAPI troubleshooting |
| Level 3 (Platform) | Bluelight Ops team | SmartAPI infrastructure |
| Level 4 (Regulator) | FIRS technical desk | Regulator endpoint outage escalation |
Escalations are time-bound and tracked to SLA targets.
17.7 Knowledge Base and Playbooks
Playbooks Available
- Rejected invoice handling
- FIRS outage fallback (queue and replay)
- Certificate expiry renewal
- Network connectivity failure recovery
- Audit evidence export process
Knowledge Base
- User guides for Finance, IT, and Compliance
- Troubleshooting FAQs
- Step-by-step guides for monitoring dashboards
17.8 Continuous Improvement
-
Quarterly service reviewsKPI analysis and performance evaluation
-
Top 5 rejection reasons analyzedCorrected via data mapping updates
-
Latency trends monitoredScaling tuned proactively
-
Regulatory updates absorbed centrallyPushed as feature-flagged upgrades
17.9 Why Clients Can Trust Our Operations
✓
Predictable
Every action defined and rehearsed
🛡️
Defensible
Audit evidence available on demand
⚡
Responsive
Incidents handled within SLA, with RCA transparency
📈
Evolving
Continuous improvements ensure long-term compliance and efficiency