In Astra Company Pte Ltd, all supplier payment requests will be routed to the Finance Department for processing on a daily basis. The requests for payment may originate from any department in the company, and each supplier invoice must be accompanied by a duly completed Payment Voucher (PV) form, delivery order (if any), and other supporting documents. 

Upon receipt of the payment requests, the Finance Clerk will first review the PV and all the attached documents to ensure the details completed on the PV are correct and complete with the authorizer's signature. The authorizer is usually the requestor's respective department head. 

If there are any missing supporting documents, incorrectly completed PV, or absence of an authorized signature, the PV will be returned to the requestor. Once the PV and documents are reviewed and verified, the Finance Clerk will then route them to the Finance Manager for approval.

Authorized PV are routed back to the Finance Clerk to prepare the payment by Internet Banking. All Internet Banking payment transactions must be authorized by the Finance Manager. The PV with all the supporting documents is filed in an arch file by payment date. 

Every Friday, the Finance Clerk will record the payment transactions in the Accounts Payable module of the company's Accounting Information System (AIS). At the end of every month, the Finance Clerk will generate the supplier payment report from the AIS for management reporting purposes. 

(a) Analyse the supplier payment process as described above. With the use of a flowchart diagram, illustrate the supplier payment process. You may make any reasonable assumptions but this has to be stated clearly. You are required to show the flowchart diagram.

(b) The three key components of an Accounting Information Systems (AIS) are:  

Transaction processing;  

General ledger and financial reporting; and  

Management reporting. 

Describe the key functions of each of these components and support your explanations with relevant examples based on the business processes as described in the case above.