Accounts Payable Workflow – How the finance department can pay physical invoices despite a home office?
Home office obligation through COVID-19, also 2021 already poses some challenges to companies again. redIT is also facing some challenges. One of these arose in our finance department: the employees are in the home office and yet the financial accounting department needs the visa or approval for physically received invoices.
Our solution to meet time and location independence was to introduce the accounts payable workflow. What this means exactly, what the mechanism is and how the solution was finally implemented at redIT, you will learn in the following.
Why automation?
Digital process automation is becoming an increasingly important must-have for companies. By automating processes, employees can be spared manual efforts. This speeds up workflows and allows employees to concentrate on the core task. In principle, recurring tasks should be automated. This can minimise errors and speed up the production of services.
How does an accounts payable workflow work?
With workflows, you digitally and automatically map processes, procedures, operational processes and approvals of your business processes. The processing steps are transparent and tailored to the needs of the company. Your everyday work becomes easier and simpler. A workflow is triggered by a trigger, for example by scanning an invoice. The individual tasks within the workflow can therefore run in parallel or sequentially as specified.
At redIT, incoming invoices are scanned by the finance department, automatically recognised and finally assigned to accounts by the accounting department. They are then approved via a web-based approval process by the orderer, cost centre or BU managers or the managing director. The various approval processes are configured in advance. After the last approval, the invoices are forwarded directly to the ERP, automatically booked. In parallel, the invoice document is archived in the document system in a legally secure way according to GeBüV.
Example accounts payable workflow redIT
With the introduction of the accounts payable workflow, entire process chains such as approvals or resubmissions can be automated. All persons involved can check and approve invoices independent of time and location. The accounting department itself knows the status of an invoice at all times. There is no longer any need to search for invoices that have been left unpaid and therefore not paid on time. You can always benefit from the discount on invoices due to the efficient processing time.
What are the advantages of an accounts payable workflow:
- Process transparency (history)
- Reduction of error susceptibility
- Reduction of throughput times
- Uniform & person-independent task processing
- Control instrument for superiors (monitoring status)
- Space savings through reduction of physical documents
- Location and time independence
We will be happy to advise you on any questions regarding the automation of your processes. The aim is not to map all processes directly digitally, but to first analyse, question and optimise them. In a second step, the digital solution is elicited and implemented.
Learn more about accounts payable workflow on our website here or in the webinaron automating processes using the example of accounts payable workflow on 18 February 2021.
