From a Custom Access Database to Enterprise Billing in Three Months

Executive Summary

The University of Oklahoma replaced an aging Microsoft Access-based billing system — one maintained by a small number of staff approaching retirement — with PeopleSoft’s delivered Billing and Accounts Receivable modules. Working with Gideon Taylor, the university consolidated external billing for service units, auxiliary accounting, and contract accounting into a single enterprise platform in just three months, eliminating operational risk while bringing all business logic into transparent, configuration-driven control.

Results at a Glance

• 20+ invoice templates consolidated into a single, data-driven layout
• 3-month implementation from project kickoff to go-live, meeting a hard October 1 deadline
• Single-point-of-failure risk eliminated — institutional knowledge now lives in the system, not in retiring staff
• Customer data cleaned from thousands of records down to approximately 1,100; service units refined from 500 to 250
• Zero external interfaces — the full AR lifecycle now flows entirely within PeopleSoft
• Minimal code customization — only the upload interface and one invoice file naming change required actual development

About the University of Oklahoma

Founded in 1890, the University of Oklahoma is a major Carnegie R1 research university serving over 30,000 students across three campuses, including the Norman campus and the OU Health Sciences Center (OUHSC). A long-time PeopleSoft customer and existing Gideon Taylor partner, OU operates a complex financial environment spanning multiple business units with distinct banking, accounting, and billing requirements.

The Challenge

For years, the University of Oklahoma managed all external billing through a custom system built in Microsoft Access. Service units across the university — hundreds of them — would send billing data to this external system, where it was processed, massaged into invoices, and then interfaced back into PeopleSoft for accounting. Chartfield data had to be fed in, accounting data had to be fed back out, and the whole arrangement created persistent opportunities for errors and reconciliation headaches.

The real urgency, though, was people. The key personnel who built and maintained the Access system were approaching retirement. The highly customized tool and its business rules lived largely in their heads — a classic single point of failure. More than 20 different invoice templates had accumulated over time, each with its own messaging and formatting quirks. A separate external application tracked accounts receivable. And none of it was governed by the same controls, security, or audit trails that PeopleSoft provided for the rest of the university’s financials.

Adding complexity, the Norman campus and OUHSC each had separate banking and remittance requirements, while the grants group was already using PeopleSoft Billing and AR through their own established processes. Any replacement had to serve both campuses and coexist cleanly with grants — without disrupting what was already working.

The Solution

Gideon Taylor deployed a comprehensive PeopleSoft Financials implementation using the platform’s delivered Billing and Accounts Receivable modules. The philosophy was straightforward: if PeopleSoft already does it, use it. Only build what you must.

A custom upload interface accepts billing data from service units in a simple, standardized format — an account, an amount, a service unit identifier, the customer, and line descriptions. From there, configuration-driven mapping tables derive everything PeopleSoft needs: valid chartfield strings, bill types, bill sources, and billing identifiers. No hardcoded logic, no buried business rules.

John Webster, a Gideon Taylor solution architect with 30 years of PeopleSoft experience who led the project, was particularly intentional about how the system handles validation errors. “A lot of times an interface will hit the first error and stop,” Webster explained. “You fix it, reload, get another error. I find that extremely frustrating. So one of our core principles was: if we throw an error, we want to know everything. The entire file is checked, and all the errors are listed so they can all be addressed before you try to reload.”

The invoice format was another major simplification. Where the legacy system had accumulated more than 20 different layouts — each requiring its own maintenance — the new system uses a single XML template. Campus logos, remit addresses, customer information, service-specific messaging, and line details are all driven by data. If a service unit needs unique messaging on their invoices, it’s configured at the bill source level, not coded into a new template.

Configuration as Control

The service unit ID serves as the key that drives nearly all business logic throughout the system. Each service unit’s mapping carries the bill type, bill source, bill-by identifier, and valid chartfield strings — meaning revenue accounting is always correct, tax applicability is automatic, and invoice formatting adapts without template changes. New service units can be onboarded by adding configuration data alone, with no development work required.

The customer model was redesigned around a standardized naming structure shared across both campuses. Legacy customer IDs are tracked alongside new PeopleSoft IDs so that service units still sending old identifiers don’t break the process. Customer contacts drive automatic email delivery of invoices. And critically, the entire customer model is kept separate from the grants group’s sponsor data, preventing any operational overlap.

Once data passes validation and mapping, it enters PeopleSoft’s delivered billing interface tables. From that point forward — invoicing, revenue journals, receivables, aging, payment application, cash journals — everything flows through delivered PeopleSoft processes with no customization.

From Kickoff to Go-Live in Three Months

The project started in late June 2025 with an immovable October 1 deadline. Meeting that timeline required discipline from both sides — and Webster credited the university’s team for making it possible.

“I give the University of Oklahoma staff enormous credit — not only for being open to this, but for being enthusiastic about it,” Webster said. “When you have a client who says ‘I really need this, I really need this,’ it’s hard to keep saying no. And they were very good about saying, nope, we’re going for what we need. There will be other opportunities for other things.”

The team prioritized a stable interface intake process, a governed customer model, integrated accounting, and the delivered AR lifecycle. Everything complex or non-essential was deferred to future phases. The university also invested significant effort in cleaning up their existing data — reducing thousands of customer records to approximately 1,100 and roughly 500 service units to about 250 — which made the migration cleaner and set up more manageable ongoing operations.

More Than a System Replacement

Reflecting on the project’s impact, Webster noted that the gains went well beyond simply retiring an old database.

“In a lot of ways, it started off as just a system replacement,” he said. “But it turns into more than that when you think about the implications. They intentionally moved business rules from custom code into configuration. They replaced informal knowledge and single points of failure with documented processing, so that the entire business group now knows how all the pieces work.”

The university now has full audit traceability from upload through cash application. Business rules are visible and transparent rather than buried in Access macros. Accounting flows through PeopleSoft’s delivered close schedule. And because the implementation is built on the delivered lifecycle, it will continue to evolve as Oracle advances the platform — without the burden of maintaining custom code.

Expanding the Solution

With the core billing and AR lifecycle running within PeopleSoft, the university has a clear runway for future enhancements — all available within the delivered platform:

• Collections functionality for managing overdue accounts
• Late fees automated through the billing process
• Payment Predictor to automate payment application, reducing manual effort across hundreds of monthly payments
• Work centers for exception-based processing and workflow visibility

Technical Implementation Details

• Interface and Upload Process:
  • Custom upload process accepting standardized files from service units
  • Comprehensive validation: customer ID, service unit ID, and account — all checked before loading
  • All-or-nothing file loading with complete error reporting in a single pass
  • Mapping tables derive chartfield strings, bill type, bill source, and bill-by identifier from service unit ID
  • Support for both legacy and new PeopleSoft customer IDs
• Customer Model:
  • Standardized naming structure shared across Norman and OUHSC campuses
  • Separated from grants/sponsor data to avoid operational conflicts
  • Ancillary data tracking: state agency status, tax exemption, UBIT applicability
  • Customer contacts configured for automatic invoice email delivery
• Invoice Framework:
  • Single XML template replacing 20+ legacy layouts
  • Four bill types across two business units (service unit and contract per campus)
  • Data-driven formatting: logos, remit addresses, messaging, and grouping all from configuration
  • Automatic sales tax calculation based on customer and account settings
• AR Lifecycle:
  • Fully delivered PeopleSoft process from billing interface through cash application
  • Automatic receivable generation from invoices
  • Revenue and payment journal creation integrated with General Ledger
  • Separate banking configuration for service unit vs. contract billing
  • Successful coexistence with existing grants billing and AR processes

Ready to Transform Your PeopleSoft Experience?

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Building photo © Andrew Goidell / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY 2.5.