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Dm OPINION: INVOICE PROCESSING So you think you're ready for Digital Transformation? Eugene Young, Country Director UK/Ireland at DocuWare, suggests 10 game-changing questions to ask before leaping into invoice automation Over the past two years, many companies turned to technology to enable efficient remote work environments for their employees and put in place the agile tools needed to remain in business. Automation became extremely important for finance and accounts payable departments who increasingly needed to find the right technology to streamline processes and automate workflows. Prior to COVID, many companies primarily received invoices via unstructured formats like paper and email. Automating these manual processes which would save time and reduce costs was not always a priority. Then when COVID hit, document management solutions were in demand as they enabled finance teams to capture, sort and archive invoices from any device or any format (scanned paper, email, mobile capture, business apps and more) and this became a way to ensure business continuity through challenging times. Today, CFO's and their teams are expected to provide deeper insight and more strategic direction than ever before. Implementing a document management solution should be an integral part of their short-term planning as it immediately frees up leadership teams, allowing them to focus efforts on strategies to increase business profitability. A document management solution increases efficiency in areas such as accounts payable, accounts receivable and financial audits. Because DocuWare solutions integrate with accounting software and ERPs, there is little strain on the customers internal IT resources. In fact, DocuWare's global network of authorised partners are expertly equipped to manage implementations smoothly. Because profitable outcomes for our Partners and their customers are top priority, DocuWare's internal sales and Professional Services teams provide comprehensive support to Partners throughout every sales process offering everything from marketing material to product demos and technical support. If you're ready to take the leap into automating your invoice processing, DocuWare can help. With our cloud-based solution, you can completely automate your invoice process, from data capture to approval, in just a few days. DON'T LEAP BLINDLY But don't invest in just any document management system; find one that provides the answers to these 10 questions: 1. Can you easily find invoices - not just search for them, but actually find them? Huge productivity benefits can be gained by providing all offices with access to a centralised document pool and by directly incorporating field-generated documents into office workflows. Think about the difference it could make if each person had the information needed to do their job - without waiting in a queue at a physical file room or searching shared and personal drives for documents. 2. Can you extract key details from the invoices, including split code billing, and automatically match them to corresponding purchase orders? This means monitoring the accounts payable email, extracting relevant index terms, such as vendor name, date, and amount, indexing the invoice, and applying artificial intelligence to all of the above so that the system learns over time. 3. Can your staff review and approve invoices on any mobile device - anywhere? Self-service access to information positively impacts everyone in the company. IDENTIFY & IMPLEMENT BEST PRACTICES 4. Do you have a secure, organised, and searchable invoice archive and audit trail for audits and budget planning? One of the most stressful times for any accounting department is the wasted effort associated with responding to auditor document requests - pulling paper documents, copying them, and refiling the originals. If you find that an approaching audit triggers a reflexive anxiety attack, dependence on manual processes is usually the root cause. Digital document management is a great tool to help you cut audit prep time and make the process itself virtually stress free. 5. Do you process invoices promptly, take advantage of early payment discounts, keep track of due dates and status changes, and 26 @DMMagAndAwards September/October 2022 www.document-manager.com
OPINION: INVOICE PROCESSING Dm "AUTOMATION OF THE INVOICING AND PAYMENT PROCESS DOES NOT JUST SAVE MONEY; IT EARNS MONEY BY ALLOWING THE COMPANY TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF DISCOUNTS. ORGANISATIONS WITH MANUAL INVOICING PROCESSES USUALLY LACK THE CORE INFORMATION THEY NEED TO EFFECTIVELY RUN THE BUSINESS - HOW MANY ORDERS ARE WAITING TO BE PROCESSED, WHERE THEY ARE IN THE PROCESS, AND THE VALUE OF EACH ORDER." have control over your cash flow management? Automation of the invoicing and payment process does not just save money; it earns money by allowing the company to take advantage of discounts. Organisations with manual invoicing processes usually lack the core information they need to effectively run the business - how many orders are waiting to be processed, where they are in the process, and the value of each order. STANDARDISE PROCESSES 6.Have you standardised the core workflows that are needed to accelerate the approval processes? Organisations typically do not realise how much wasted time and effort and money is tied up in simply waiting for a manual process to move from one manual stage to another. A workflow routes a task to multiple people or departments to review it, make decisions about it and then pass it on to the next person or kick off the next step in a process. A digital workflow enables your staff to automatically route digitised information to other process owners securely. You can use a digital workflow to bring multiple team members together to review an invoice and approve or reject it. These workflows can be serial (one step after another), parallel, or they can change based on decision points chosen along the way. 7. Is the supplier on-boarding process still a manual nightmare? This is a source of a great deal of inefficiency, especially for larger organisations and those with a large number of field offices. 8. Can you route invoice approval requests based on amounts, vendor name or split code billing with multi-levels? Automatic electronic workflows give an organisation the flexibility to keep work moving forward even when someone is away from the office. 9. Can you automatically post approved invoices to your accounting or ERP system, eliminating double data entry and errors? Data should only be entered once either manually or via automated indexing before being shared between systems. This integration with other applications enables streamlined workflows across business functions 10. Have you standardised the core workflows that are needed to accelerate the approval process? Organisations typically do not realise how much wasted time and effort - and money - is tied up in simply waiting for a manual process to move from zone manual stage to another. Once you begin the process of invoice automation and seek a solution, remember these additional questions as you talk to vendors: How does their product handle cybersecurity as work-from-home and hybrid work continues to be important? Can their solution be deployed via the cloud or on-premises - without sacrificing functionality? How quickly can their solution be deployed? Can the solution provider give you a reference list of customers from your industry? Can you buy a scalable solution - or is a big upfront investment required? Can the solution be easily extended to other processes outside of finance, or is it just a point solution? While financial process automation initiatives may start with the intent of reducing costs, the longer-term organisational impact provides an opportunity to redefine the role of the CFO. Looking forward, the CFO will continue to be the primary financial steward of the organisation. But the CFO also has a larger role to play, leading the charge for broader process transformation, and ultimately the digital transformation of the business itself. Ready to eliminate manual touch from your invoice process? Contact us for a free demo and when you are ready to get started, contact one of our expert partners via the URL below. More info: www.DocuWare.com/find a partner www.document-manager.com September/October 2022 @DMMagAndAwards 27
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DM Sep-Oct 2022

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