Accounting functions all share an equal share as their contribution is significant for the success of the businesses. In this article we discuss one such function that is an unsung hero but yet plays a greater role in the “accounts payable” function. Management cannot undermine its contribution as it is multifaceted in the overall well being of the firm through cordial relationships with

• Vendors - to generate goodwill through prompt payment.
• Supply chain - to take advantage of discounts through early payment of invoices.
• CFO - inform the liquidity position and cash flow requirements.

Why does a necessity arise to automate your accounts payable process?

Any process involving payment of funds needs to be meticulously calculated and executed. Accounts payable staff works with stacks of paper or pdf invoices from various suppliers, needs to verify them for accuracy before sending them manually to the approval authority and once approved release it for payment. This invoice processing cycle

• Introduces avoidable and unavoidable errors in the procedure
• Is a time consuming and tedious process
• Creates chances of either underpayment, overpayment or duplicate payment of invoices
• Could delay vendor payments
• Opens a window for fraudulent activities
• Auditing becomes a difficult task

Also read : What are the five best recommendations for automating your accounts payable process?

As per J.P. Morgan webinar, around 81% of the business firms are impacted by fraudulent or malpractice claims. This gives a good background for Accounts Payable Automation to efficiently handle both back-end financial operations and front-end vendor services timely and precisely.

Automation safeguards the business against

• illegitimate release of payment
• sets the tone for process workflow with multiple layers of authorization
• avoiding delay of payment
• enhancing security of payments
• reducing operations and processing costs

What are best practices of accounts payable automation?

The prime motive behind migration from manual to automation is to bring new practices into the system without interruption to the already existing workflow. The pain points costing the firms’ exchequer through AP automation will herald favorable results in the following areas.

• Fetching data - from source document repositories such as email, dropbox etc. is a key area for complete information gathering. Automation helps to gather all these document storage without missing them
• Data entry - is another area where humans make errors, omission and time lapses. When accounts payable robotic automation software is deployed we notice an abrupt change in reduction of errors and efficient aggregation of data from various sources rapidly, sans errors and minimal time.
• Two way match - is the prime area where the vendor's invoice is matched with the actual work completed or products delivered. If the invoice is supported with a copy of the delivery note and purchase order then it should take no time in endorsing the invoice processing (three-way matching). Software bots, do the comparison function in no time with higher precision than humans.
• Autorule invoice coding - Through automation, when rules are established and charts of accounts are coded then there are hardly any discrepancies found in the invoice ledgering which is a common issue in manual processes.
• Invoice routing for approval - is a remedy for manual processes consuming time, risk of losing invoices, and creating an inflexible workflow. Through the established automation channel it becomes easier to track the invoices at various stages due to digital set-up..

What are the AP automation benefits?

AP automation is not limited to the finance division, its impact is felt across the board of the organization. It never stands as a bottleneck for growth rather helps to alleviate the teams’ morale. The most obvious benefits are

• Advantage of a cost center transforming into a profit center in the long run.
• Avoidance in numerical errors, increasing accuracy and minimizing the tasks processing time.
• Evolving into paperless offices bringing austerity into office storage spaces and equipment.
• Auditing and compliances becomes easier and any abnormal activities can be detected through audit trails.
• Retention of employees becomes easier as they are given more valuable tasks to complete.
• Finally, the firm comes under the good books of the vendors / customers due to prompt and error free payments.

Also read : How do Accounting firms and bookkeeping practices ensure their data security during deployment of robots?

Where Integra Global Solutions fits the bill to accommodate firms of all sizes through streamlining accounts payable process?

The idea behind automation is not delegating a job to a robot rather eliminating it and freeing people time for a rather significant purpose.

Our accounts payable robotic automation platform can review invoices, store supplier details and execute payment to vendors in their own preferred method (bank transfer, wire etc.). The interactive dashboard displays information from the invoices payment status, outstanding invoices etc. This technology infrastructure is meant to function without adding manpower and from the economic point of view a low margin of cost.

If you want to know more about how we can help you in AP automation, contact us to get a free demo.