The Many Faces of A/P Automation

Many departments may claim to be the heart of an organization. None, however, are quite as critical as the Accounts Payable team. Without the A/P team paying vendors and other invoices, it would be impossible to work at all! Somebody has to keep the lights on, right?

As your partner in process automation, particularly A/P automation, we know that each role in the invoice payment process is significant. Each person is under stress, with things piling up around them (literally, when still using paper) and documents can get lost or delayed, which creates more pressure on everyone involved.

So let’s start by breaking down each role. The indexer who is responsible for receiving the invoice and entering the data into “the system”; the editor, an optional role based on your business process who may need to add or update G/L codes, project and task detail or other information; and finally, the approver who is ultimately responsible for approving the invoice before it is paid. Each of these roles needs a quick and simple experience that doesn’t introduce errors or delays.

With KwikTag, the indexer’s (most commonly the A/P manager) experience involves little or no data entry – your call. The real-time connection to your ERP system (for Dynamics GP and SL) enables you to select a few fields via drop-down and look-up options straight from your ERP, requiring minimal data entry. Or, if you prefer, the data can be extracted via OCR and auto-populate the invoice fields. Either way, it’s quick and simple.

Next up is the editor role. If your invoice process requires a department manager or project manager to review and sometimes edit or add codes, comments or other data, the invoice can be automatically emailed to that person with a notification to edit as needed in KwikTag. This can be done in a click or two, without leaving your desk!

Finally, the approver can receive an email with all of the invoice data, along with an attachment of the invoice, and they can simply reply with their approval or rejection. If they prefer the web experience to quickly review a “batch” of invoices at the same time, of course, that option is just a click away. No more bottlenecks or approval delays.

The end result? The invoice data entry, coding or editing, and final approval can all be done digitally, with a workflow designed to meet your business process. What previously could have taking 35 or more days when done manually, can now be completed end-to-end in 5 days or less. The best part is that once you have an A/P automation solution in place, the cost of invoice processing can be reduced from nearly $30 per invoice to less than $5. And, with KwikTag, you can use the same system to automate any other manual process in your organization.

Learn more about how KwikTag can help with your A/P automation.