Office robot a big help in summer peak season

An important – and boring – workload has been lifted from the office workers in Royal Greenland’s International Sales Department. Situated in Denmark, the department handles sales and order processing of goods from Greenland and Canada for countries outside Europe. Each sales order must be accompanied by a number of official documents, i.e. a health certificate from the Veterinary and Food Administration. Each year, close to 1,700 health certificates are needed to accompany sales orders.

Slow and time-consuming process

The employees in the International Sales Department used to spend 30-40 minutes on each certificate; Data must be collected from various sources, before the staff log onto the Danish Veterinary and Food Administration’s website and enter a large amount of data manually, which then generates a unique health certificate number that is used as part of the sales documentation.

During peak fishing season in the summertime, the International Sales Department is very busy. The time-consuming task of creating health certificates used to contribute to additional work, making it hard to get time off for summer vacations. 

Robotics Process Automation lifts workload

As a part of the increased focus on digitalization and automation at Royal Greenland, a cross-functional team ‘the Robot Team’ has been established. The team maps repetitive and monotonous processes in administration that are suitable for automation.

Based on a detailed process description from the International Sales Department, the Robotic Process Automation team has succeeded in programming a software robotic assistant to undertake this time-consuming work of creating health certificates. The department can now convert time to more interesting and value-creating activities related to customers, better service and a more rewarding workday. And luckily there is also room for summer vacation!

What is Robotics Process Automation (RPA)?

RPA is a software robot that can perform routine administrative tasks by copying an employee's routine tasks across the underlying systems and documents. The software robot is part of the existing IT landscape and can thereby work with and across the systems and documents that are already used.

Since the robot is not capable of independent thought, it can only handle routine tasks that adhere to specific rules, and which the robot must be able to ‘learn’ to perform via programming. A software robot can work 24/7/365 and can thereby also help to reduce the seasonal peak workloads at Royal Greenland.

What is a health certificate?

What is a health certificate?

Food exports to most countries outside Europe must carry a health certificate that is printed from the Veterinary and Food Administration on special sheets. Each sheet has a unique number and must be physically stamped and signed by the Veterinary and Food Administration.

The health certificate is the Danish food safety authorities’ verification that a product meets the high Danish food standards.