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11.19.08 Top Ways to Drive Web Invoicing
Receiving electronic invoices via the Web versus paper via the mail saves AP departments time and money. Of course, the trick is to get vendors to do it! At our recent 7th Annual AP Conference & Expo in Las Vegas, Bruce Kelly, managing director at The Hackett Group, shared with attendees the results of their recent research that reveals the most cited ways organizations drive the move toward Web-based invoices. more...
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11.12.08 Don’t Over-Promise on Tech Savings
One of the most common—but avoidable-mistakes AP managers make when planning for automation is to over-promise the savings that are expected to be achieved.
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11.05.08 Right-Size Your AP Automation
At our recent 7th Annual AP Conference & Expo in Las Vegas, some AP managers were scrambling to look for automation tools to cut their department’s costs in 2009. Reason: Their 2009 budgets promised reduced costs, so the tools are now needed to help deliver on those promises. Before you rush into a decision, make sure you avoid both underspending and overspending on your solution. more...
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10.22.08 Advanced Tool Closes T&E Loophole
Up to now, if an employee booked travel that was in line with organization policy and then upgraded beyond policy while on the road, you’d be hard pressed to catch this after the fact. You’d have to go through expense reports manually and compare actual spending with what was originally booked. Now, automated T&E systems are offering stronger tools to help close this loophole.
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10.15.08 End-to-End T&E System is Best
Organizations are improving their management of travel and entertainment (T&E) expenses through the increased use of automated “end-to-end” solutions that link together disparate processes and data, according to new research from the Aberdeen Group.
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10.08.08 AP Tech-Speak
Imaging… OCR…..EIPP… Software-as-Service—these are some common terms used in AP automation, but they can sometimes be confusing. So here are some quick definitions to help understand some of the acronyms and jargon being thrown around. We’ll add to this list in future e-Alerts and keep it updated as new terms come into play.
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10.01.08 Report: E-Invoices to Exceed Paper by 2010
The number of electronic invoices in the United States will overtake the number of paper invoices by 2010, reveals the Electronic Invoicing Adoption Survey Report from PayStream Advisors. The report is based on the results of PayStream's survey of 280 accounts payable, procurement, and treasury professionals.
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09.24.08 Personal “Fit” With a Tech Provider
One of the often overlooked aspects about selecting a solution provider for an automated AP application is the personal compatibility between you and your department and the solution provider. But personalities can make or break a working relationship. The individuals who specify, install, test, debug, and support your automated solution will be a significant part of your business life for some period of time. That’s why it’s important to assess their ability to get along with you and your team.
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09.17.08 Vendor Portal KOs Pesky Calls
“Do you have my invoice?” “When am I getting paid?” These are the two big questions on the all-time hit parade of vendor calls coming in to AP. But with a vendor portal you can eliminate all these incoming calls. And it’s become one of the very critical AP automation tools. This technology, also known as Interactive Web Response (IWR) is the Internet version of Interactive Voice Response (IVR). Most providers of automated invoice solutions can provide a vendor portal for self-service queries of purchase order and payment status.
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09.10.08 Working With an AP Technology Consultant
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09.05.08 Test Your AP IQ: Back-End Imaging
What is the definition of back-end imaging? more...
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09.03.08 First Step in Invoice Automation
Transforming paper invoices into electronic form is the dream of many AP managers. But where do you start? You need to have an overall framework that can guide your thinking and ensure success. The first step in the evaluation process is to conduct an internal assessment. Surveys we have done reveal that AP managers have a long way to go in this process. While they acknowledge the importance of thorough analysis, there is a gap between belief and action.
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08.27.08 Key to a Good AP-IT Relationship
Your relationship with your information technology (IT) folks can make or break your efforts to automate AP. But they’re not the easiest people to work with. On the same token, they may feel the same way about you. So what can be done to ensure a good relationship between AP and IT? I posed that question to an IT pro who works with AP on an extensive invoice imaging and workflow application.
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08.25.08 >>>Benchmark Your AP Operations<<<
How much does it cost AP departments to process an invoice? How many invoices should AP staffers be able to process in a month? What is the average error rate for payments? You will get the answers to these questions--and a lot more—if you take part in our survey. more...
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08.20.08 100% e-Invoicing for Hospitals
A new online service provides hospitals with a way to get 100 percent of their invoices electronically, even from vendors who insist on submitting invoices via snail mail. The service, OnDemand AP™, is a partnership between BancTec and GHX. BancTec specializes in high-volume document and payment processing services, and GHX operates the largest electronic trading exchange and invoicing network in the healthcare industry.
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08.14.08 >>> AP Benchmarking Survey Now Open <<<
How much does it cost AP departments to process an invoice? How many invoices should AP staffers be able to process in a month? What is the average error rate for payments? You will get the answers to these questions--and a lot more—if you take part in our AP Benchmarking Survey. We’ll send you the results so you can see how your AP department stacks up against all the others.
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08.13.08 Your Vendors’ Slant on E-Invoicing
We do a lot of research into how AP departments use electronic invoices—and the benefits they achieve. But what about the other side? That is, what do your vendors think about e-invoicing? Understanding their feelings can help you convince them to start sending you invoices electronically.
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08.06.08 Move Imaging From Back to Front
While back-end imaging can be important to many organizations, for most, the major benefits will come from re-engineering the processes and applying workflow tools to enable front-end imaging to make a real difference. Over the past few years, the development of AP-oriented, easy-to-maintain workflow tools has made workflow, rather than archiving, the primary driver. more...
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07.30.08 E-Z EDI For Any Size Vendor
Traditional EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) for electronic invoicing is well-suited to your large vendors—but what about all of your small and medium-size vendors? It’s not easy for them to implement EDI, so you’ll have a tough time convincing them to send you electronic invoices. Sure, you can outsource the task to a “third-party supplier network,” but many AP departments would rather keep the function in-house. Circuit City uses a type of EDI that any vendor can use—they just need Internet access. more...
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07.16.08 Break AP Tech Projects Into Steps
Installing an automated AP system can be complex and confusing--unless it is broken down into manageable steps. At the recent RECAP/IOMA AP Conference in Ft. Lauderdale, Darren Pate, Director of Financial Operations at Sonepar USA, talked about some of the hard-learned lessons he acquired while implementing automated AP processes at Cameron & Barkley Co. and Hughes Supply.
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06.25.08 Double-Digit Growth for Imaging Solutions
According to our research, slightly over half (51%) of AP departments we surveyed say they currently use imaging. Of those who do not currently use imaging, 44% said they plan on using it over the next 12 months. When you total up these two groups, almost three-quarters (73%) of the total respondents will have imaging in place in the near future. This is consistent with recent findings by Paystream Advisors that reveal that almost half the respondents to its recent survey stated that they were using imaging and workflow automation (IWA) solutions. more...
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06.18.08 Souped-Up Scanning Tackles 6K Invoices a Day
Exel Transportation Services provides payment services for transportation brokerages. They were being overwhelmed by an average of 126,000 invoices a month—about 6,000 a day—so they upgraded their traditional invoice imaging process to “intelligent scanning.”
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06.12.08 Instant Messaging Decreases Interruptions
Are your AP workers being interrupted a lot with phone calls, e-mails, and people coming in to the AP department? Then try this: Have them use instant messaging software on the job.
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06.11.08 Biggest Barrier to E-Invoicing
Lack of knowledge about electronic invoicing is the reason most cited by AP pros for not moving forward with this technology. One-third of over 300 AP pros we recently polled said this was the biggest barrier, followed by “lack of priority” of investment in AP automation. more...
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06.04.08 Want More E-Invoices? Just Ask
The benefits of electronic invoicing from AP’s perspective are clear: less manual data entry, fewer errors, faster payments—to name a few. The benefits are also clear to your mirror-image counterparts at your vendors—the accounts receivable folks. The AR people know that e-invoicing benefits their organization by eliminating all associated mailing costs (paper, postage, clerical time, etc.), gives them greater visibility into billing, and can help improve their DSO (Days Sales Outstanding), which is the flip-side of the DPO (Days Payables Outstanding) metric.
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06.03.08 Tracking a New AP Project
It’s a lot of work to get a new AP project planned and approved. But the work is just beginning because now you have to actually make it happen. And an important part of this is to track your progress, using software such as Microsoft Project to figure out your steps and your sequential deadlines for different tasks.
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05.28.08 41 Questions to Ask About a SEP Solution
A new white paper from PayStream Advisors gives an overview of the Supplier Electronic Payment (SEP) solutions on the market today. PayStream points out that a SEP solution is just one component of a larger Financial Supply Chain or Web Invoicing arrangement, which in an overall sense, includes the ability to send electronic POs to vendors and receive, validate and process invoices and payments electronically.
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05.23.08 Test Your AP IQ: Barriers to EDI
How familiar are you with AP rules, regulations, and best practices? Here’s a multiple-choice question to test your knowledge: Which of the following is NOT a barrier to using traditional Electronic Data Interchange (EDI)?
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05.21.08 Get a SAS 70 Seal of Approval
Using a third party for AP automation is getting more common. For example, an outsourcer may do your invoice scanning as part of your imaging setup. When you do this, you are still on the hook for it from an internal control standpoint. This is particularly important under the internal control requirements of Section 404 of Sarbanes-Oxley. Your organization is still responsible for ensuring the control of a process regardless of whether it’s handled in-house or not.
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05.14.08 T&E System is Most Essential Data Source
In the past, we have made the point that one of the biggest benefits of an automated system for reimbursing employees for travel and entertainment (T&E) expenses is the data that an automated system can provide. The information can be sliced and diced and used to analyze T&E spending and to negotiate discounts with airlines, hotels, and other T&E providers. Recent research from the Aberdeen Group confirms this. more...
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