CFO’s are being expected to make more strategic decisions as market conditions toughen, which is forcing the need to implement time saving processes to free up valuable time that can be used to focus on human centric tasks. At the heart of many successful businesses driving growth, and supporting CFO’s invaluably, is Accounts Payable (AP) Automation software. This kind of technology is no longer seen as a ‘nice to have’ and instead, has become a business ‘must-have’.
AP Automation software is allowing finance teams to offload the time-consuming, labour-intensive manual tasks such as data entry, invoice coding and approvals to robust software, so they can focus on more valuable tasks. In a recent study, 80% of workers surveyed said automation had given them more time to focus on other tasks, enhance their skills and deepen customer relationships.
Not only does AP Automation save time, but it reduces human errors which can be common in labour intensive tasks such as data entry and can have costly implications. Automating your accounts payable means invoices are automatically captured, coded and approval workflows cause all the time-consuming elements of accounts payable to be eliminated, producing a seamless, error free and efficient process. Automation also reduces the likelihood of overpayments and useful fraud detection features reduce the risk of fraud which can be costly for organisations – according to a survey by Medius, an estimated £295,000 is lost per year to invoice fraud.
AP Automation software has become a strategic asset to any CFO and in the survey mentioned above, more than 90% of workers admitted that automation has increased their productivity.
Real-time data gives instant access to spot trends or potential issues, triggering an immediate response and smarter, data-driven decision making. This can give you a 360-degree visibility into your spend, supplier relationships and status of each invoice, and an overall tightly managed cashflow which is essential for business growth.
The average financial teams take 23 days to process an invoice, making it impossible to meet most early payment discounts offered by suppliers, which in turn affects not only supplier relationships, but also your bottom line – 39% of business professionals believe poor supplier relationships are costing their business money. In fact, research has found a staggering 75% early payment discounts aren’t obtained because AP teams can’t process the invoices quick enough. Automating your accounts payable can speed up invoice approval by 5.5 days, giving you a chance to obtain discounts, and improve your supplier relationships in the process.
Any growing business needs dynamic systems in place that will adapt to changing demands, and an AP automation system will allow you to process more invoices, quicker, and at a significantly lower cost than employing more finance personnel to manually process invoices. Robust, scalable solutions that will grow with your business should be at the heart of any growth strategy.
Critical for business growth are standardised, streamlined processes which result in faster outcomes and a reduced likelihood of problems. Automating your accounts payable is an ideal business function to introduce automation and implement streamlined business processes due to the sheer number of steps which are perfect opportunities for costly errors or hold-ups to occur.
Unlocking new business processes has become essential to business growth and helps businesses, like yours, stay competitive in the fast-paced economy. Streamlining multi-step processes like accounts payable can reduce errors with costly ramifications, along with the risk of invoice fraud which can have devastating consequences. Any growth strategy should focus on efficiency gains, and AP automation can drive efficiency in many ways from reducing costs, increasing productivity, and saving valuable time.
For more information about how AP Automation could help your business, or to learn more about Opera 3 SQL SE AP Automation then please contact us today.
Posted On: November 02, 2023
