How Bad Accounts Payable Practices Are Breaking Your Supply Chain

If you’re a part of a retail accounts payable (AP) team, you know how delicate of a balancing act your day-to-day job is.

Between ensuring invoices are paid on-time and maintaining strong relationships with your suppliers to the myriad of challenges that go into achieving it all–you’ve got a lot on your plate. Without the right accounts payable processes and technology in place you risk late or missing payments, out of control costs, and damaged supplier relationships. 

While only 20% of AP teams are fully automated, another 41% of companies plan to adopt AP automation within the next year.

Let’s highlight some areas where you may not realize you’re lacking efficiency, how they’re damaging your supply chain, and what you can do about it.

Where you’re going wrong

Don’t feel bad. Accounts payable teams across the globe are plagued with many of the same pain points. However, it’s important you identify them before they continue to linger and take a chunk out of your bottom line. Here are some of the ones you should start managing ASAP:

Lacking a way to achieve 3 and 4-way matching. One of the major steps in the accounts payable workflow is three- and four-way document matching. It helps increase accuracy, save money, and maintain accurate records. But if you’ve tried to perform them manually you know they’re difficult, if not impossible to complete.

Slow processing. Manual invoice processing takes time. A lot of time. By considering automation you’ll be able to avoid late payment fees, improve cash flow, and allow you and your team to focus on more high-value tasks. 

Slow data deduction processes. Gathering deduction data for each supplier is another time-consuming task. Without a way to do this quickly and efficiently, you risk creating major inefficiencies within your supply chain. 

Inconsistent manual data entry. This is quite possibly the most rampant problem for accounts payable teams.  It’s true that the smallest error can lead to the costliest mistake for your business and even when you realize you’ve made one, it is even more time-consuming to go back, find it, and correct it.

Poor partner communication. Communication can also be a huge hurdle if you’re working in accounts payable. If you and your team lack a centralized mode of communication, attempting to navigate multiple channels and applications to obtain clarification on discrepancies can be an exercise in futility. 

Rejected invoices. When invoices are rejected due to poor data quality or failure to meet established business rules, it leads to delays in payment processing and disrupts cash flow. This inefficiency not only slows down reconciliation efforts but also requires additional resources to identify and correct errors.

Inaccurate charges. Being overcharged or undercharged can lead to costly adjustments and renegotiations that impact budget forecasting and increase the risk of disputes. Both situations require time-consuming audits and reconciliation efforts that divert resources from other critical supply chain functions.

Shipped but not invoiced. When shipments are sent without corresponding invoices, it creates discrepancies in inventory records and financial tracking. This can lead to confusion in your accounts receivable process, delaying payments, and making it difficult to accurately assess cash flow and inventory levels.

Invoiced but not shipped. Invoices issued for goods not yet shipped cause confusion in inventory planning and customer expectations. This can lead to inaccurate financial records and customer dissatisfaction, as well as increased administrative efforts to track down the shipment status.

How it’s hurting your supply chain

It’s not your fault. Human error is inevitable when it comes to any job, but continuing to make the same mistakes over and over can irreparably damage your supply chain down the road.  

For example, without a way to be more automated around three-and four-way matching and consistent data entry, you risk accuracy problems and major discrepancies with your suppliers. This can cause you to be late on payments which can lead to a credit hold and the inability to get the product you need, when you need it.

Additionally, if you’re lacking a centralized platform that can streamline communication between you and your suppliers and help facilitate vendor compliance programs, it’s possible that quality could suffer and you could damage the relationship you have with them.

How Syncrofy can help

Syncrofy is the multi-enterprise, AI-enabled supply chain platform you need to achieve a centralized view of your entire retail operation. You can communicate with your internal AP team and external partners via order notes, document comments, and exceptions to get answers to AP-related questions and solve discrepancies. Syncrofy also empowers you to tag and share information through in-app push notifications and email alerts. 

Syncrofy is also your catalyst when it comes to creating end-to-end supply chain efficiency by helping you streamline your data deduction process. Simply configure Syncrofy to report and alert you when deductions are applicable to a given supplier. 

And when it comes to three and four-way document matching, Syncrofy makes it easy. It automatically correlates all orders with acceptances, ASNs, receiving, and the corresponding invoice to ensure what was ordered is what was received—before paying an invoice.

Syncrofy stands out from other solutions in the marketplace because it provides you with full visibility and valuable insights on your supply chain right out of the box. There’s nothing to configure, no mapping, or specialized data warehouse required. From the get go, you can see what’s going on across your network, what’s working, and where potential problems may occur. This allows you to be proactive, respond to disruption, and stay on the same page with suppliers.

Are you ready to give Syncrofy a try to see what it can do for your retail supply chain?

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