Implementing accounts payable (AP) automation software will empower you to streamline your financial forecasting and make it an efficient, cost-effective operation. Inefficient forecasting and payment processes are overlooked, often wasteful byproducts of relying on manual paper-based accounting procedures. By migrating your AP to an automated digital platform like AvidXchange, you will capture better visibility, reduce costs, improve finance security and solidify your relationships with your vendors.
Improving your financial forecasting is a multi-stage process, but payment automation will both augment and build a foundation for all your other strategic account efforts. AP software built in the cloud allows you to consolidate all of the tedious, time-consuming and costly tasks that eat away at your finance team’s work hours and budget. Forecasting is critical to your long-term business goals, and only by deploying a modern solution can you fully optimize these processes to allow for streamlined payment efficiency.
Here are a few ways implementing AvidXchange for AP automation will make your financial forecasting more efficient and empower you to meet your strategic revenue goals:
Capturing More Cashflow Visibility and Control
Manual accounting processes can cause your reporting to become jammed up as your finance team constantly adjusts to a disparate sequence of inconsistent AP methodologies. Irregular delivery channels and systems mean that accounts payable processors are having to continuously figure out how to manage each new payment. The time wasted sorting through this mess stalls other tasks, and keeps you from capturing visibility into your finances, which consequently will also hamper your forecasting.
AvidXchange enables you to centralize your chaotic payment documentation and processes within a single, intuitive data hub. With the AP automation tools provided in your software platform, you can consolidate your disorderly touchpoints to a few key points of control overseen closely by your managers. These carefully managed channels will let your AP team process payments smoothly and quickly, and deliver valuable insight through advanced analytics included with your solution.
Reducing Costs Through Payment Automation
Pen and paper-based financial processes also produce excessive waste for all the resources used, in addition to all the time exhausted physically managing the overwhelming volume of individual payments. 70% of SMBs worldwide still use paper checks, invoices, etc., spending trillions annually on materials just to complete these payments. The time takes to process the hundreds to thousands of payments each year also eats up a lot of accounting work hours, and can generate added costs if late payments lead to penalization from partners.
AP automation with AvidXchange drastically reduce traditional costs associated with accounts payable processes. Invoices and other documentation are delivered electronically, removing the mounting expenses from paper filing from the equation. Automated digital payments also help accelerate your delivery times, eliminating late fees and allowing you to plan for AP rebates in your financial forecasting.
Improving Internal and External Accounting Security
Opaque and inaccurate accounts payable processes can hide another harmful consequence – payment fraud that can drive your losses even further. The proliferation of accounting scams is what generates complicated approval processes in the first place, yet savvy bad actors still find many ways to exploit paper check-based payment systems. Not all electronic forms of payment are immune either, and the new normal has exacerbated vulnerabilities with employees working from home often too distracted to fully complete AP due diligence.
AvidXchange provides a more secure kind of accounts payable automation with multiple layers of security controls and real-time visibility through SaaS. Each e-invoice and transaction produces an electronic audit trail that can be traced to review legitimacy. Access is strictly enforced through role-based permissions, so fraudulent charges can more easily be identified and tracked back to the source.
Strengthening Vendor Relationships Through Better Service
COVID-19 helped to highlight the reliance US businesses have on a connected, seamlessly operating supply chain, and accounts payable processes are one of the key cogs of this machine. Vendor relationships are more important than ever, yet continuing to over-rely on outdated payment procedures could put your partnerships at serious risk. For many of the reasons outlined in previous points, your vendor relations can be held back by inefficiency and lack of clear communication.
Through equal parts technology and professional services, AvidXchange ensures that your AP payments are processed smoothly on the partner side. With accounting automation functionality delivered through the cloud, payments are delivered exactly according to predefined methods and timetables. AvidXchange’s service team works diligently to address any potential issues as well, aiding in the prompt transfer of funds to your steady partners.
Streamline Financial Forecasting with AvidXchange AP Automation
AP automation consolidates all of your financial reporting controls, reduces inaccuracies and the time it takes to process each payment. This empowers you to gain better visibility, mitigate costs and improve security and service, all of which contributes to determining your bottom-line profit return. By streamlining these items with accounts payable software, you will finally be able to capture the level of accuracy you need in your financial data to employ useful forecasting.
Your finance team faces many challenges when it comes to correctly forecasting for the future and providing actionable deliverables that fulfill your long-term strategic business goals. Augmenting your financial planning with automation through software will enable you to better pivot for the new normal, and digitally transform what are otherwise costly legacy processes that can hold your company back during these uncertain times. If you’re interested in learning more about how AP automation enables more efficient financial forecasting, we encourage you to watch this webinar.
Discover the Strategic Benefits of Accounts Payable Software
COVID-19 has accelerated investment in and migration to digital technologies, but even before the pandemic, accounts payable lagged behind other areas in adapting to the new age. Automating your AP processes with SWK Technologies and AvidXchange will enable you to get ahead of your competition by helping you transform tactical pain points into strategic opportunities.
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