Now more than ever, businesses across all industries are seeking ways in which to improve efficiencies and reduce costs. Companies are beginning to realize that the Accounts Payable (AP) process is where they can make the most immediate, significant and controllable improvements in cash flow and process management.
AP is one of the most critical areas of all business operations, and an effective, efficient AP system can set the model for the rest of the business. However, no matter how accurate or functional your Payables team maybe, a manual-dependent process is cumbersome, prone to fraud and human error and is significantly more time consuming and tedious.
AP personnel can and should be focused on much more than matching invoices, getting invoice approvals, data entry, and getting checks signed, postmarked, and mailed. Automation is the foundation of that transformation; automated AP eliminates these outdated, time consuming processes, and allows companies to apply their rich human capital to truly value-added duties, like analyzing data and discovering new and better ways to improve financial operations.
The long-term value, savings, and benefits that automation provides surpasses any up-front costs and changes to the status quo, and provides additional, substantial intrinsic benefits to the organization such as job satisfaction and career development opportunity.
Invoice Data Entry
Automating the invoice data entry process dramatically reduces the amount of time it takes to code all the invoice data into your accounting system and nearly eliminates the time it takes to catch and remedy any errors. MineralTree provides solutions that integrate with nearly all ERP and accounting systems, capturing invoice data and syncing it with your accounting system. The best automation tools are coding invoice data at 99.5% accuracy, leaving little to no room for any errors.
Invoice Approvals & Matching
Manually routing and collecting invoice approvals involves keeping track of countless communication threads and emails, constantly following up with department heads, or matching the invoice to the corresponding purchase order; all tedious and time-consuming tasks.
Automating these processes virtually removes manual intervention; with automation, invoices are automatically routed to the correct approver(s), and automated reminders can be set to remind approvers of upcoming deadlines. Similarly, automated purchase order matching uses algorithms to compare invoices to their corresponding POs and flag cases that need further review and/or validation. This method ensures that invoices don’t slip through the cracks.
Payment Execution
Once a payment has been cleared, an invoice historically is sent or delivered to the person who will make the payment. This person must keep track, again manually, of all due dates as well as any discount opportunities. Manually keeping track of the hundreds of invoices that need to be processed monthly is an unrealistic, and unscalable challenge, that if not executed flawlessly, will lead to missed or overdue payments, and a loss of revenue – your revenue.
With an automated payment solution, all payment options are immediately identifiable, so any payment option can be easily selected and executed. Approved payments can be scheduled and automatically sent out at the optimal time, taking advantage of every early-pay discount or cash-back opportunity available, synchronized between your ERP and automation solution.
Your Finance Organization can transform dramatically though AP automation. AP automation technology provides the opportunities to mitigate costs, streamline processes and improve efficiencies that resonate across all areas of the business, that once seemed impossible under a manual accounts payable organization.
