More blog posts in Finance & AccountingWhere is place located?

Finance & Accounting

4 Posts authored by: Kerry Ann OConnor

Well the month of May is more then half way completed, and it has been an extremely busy month.

 

Trying to get caught up after the most amazing Ariba Live this year, and then Mother's Day, and then off to the annual IAPP conference to see old friends and meet up with the Ariba team.

 

Hence the late posting of my blog this month. In addition this posting will be short and sweet. My advice is you do not want to miss tomorrow's Network Webinar, If any of you were able to attend Al's panel discussion at Ariba Live, you know he has a great story to tell and you want to hear more details.

 

So take an early lunch, eat your lunch at your desk, and join the webinar!

 

Driving PO Compliance and E-invoicing at GSK North America


Driving PO Compliance and E-invoicing at GSK North America
Webinar * NEW
May 19, 2011 Time: 2:00 p.m. EDT | 11:00 a.m. PDT
60 minutes
Invoice & Payment
You’ve probably heard the buzz: e-invoicing is virtually eliminating the AP challenges faced by you and your colleagues; namely, high processing costs, lost discounts, errors and exceptions, and outdated EDI.

 

Are you wondering if this is all hype, or the real deal? Well I can tell you that it is the real deal, and Al Barbee, Director of GSK’s North America Shared Financial Service division, says the benefits are indeed real, and he’s looking forward to sharing them with you in this webinar.
This is a great opportunity to learn first-hand how GSK is reaping numerous benefits through Ariba’s highly efficient and effective procure-to-pay process.

 

Recently a former colleague and good friend wondered why I was continuing to work in the same field so long. “How can accounts payable be that exciting?” she asked me.

 

"It’s an area that is changing so fast,” I responded. “E-invoicing is removing paper invoices and introducing real transformation to the AP function.”

 

The question caught me by surprise. It wasn't until I read a recent Aberdeen report that I really understood my passion for the electronic invoicing, it was not just the reduction in paper invoices. What comes after removal of the paper invoices is what is now driving the passion for AP transformation.

 

In a recent research report from Aberdeen Group on payables automation, the analyst emphasized the value of e-payables beyond helping companies eliminate paper and taking cost out of their processes.  The report, entitled “Gaining Control in the Face of Uncertainty,” states that, e-Invoicing is critical for optimizing working capital and maximizing discount capture. Ariba’s success in this area with companies like AstraZeneca, and Nalco demonstrates how leading organizations are leveraging e-Invoicing to drive working capital strategies and mitigate liquidity risk in their supply chains.

 

This is quite a change from a few years ago, when AP scorecards focused on metrics such as counting keystrokes and the number of FTEs required to process paper invoices. Electronic invoicing unleashes entirely new opportunities to elevate the value of AP staff from data entry clerks to data analysts, and creates opportunities to improve the way AP manages its cash. Today it feels like we are moving at a very fast speed, almost at a nanosecond (well not really).

 

If you would like to learn more about the working capital impact of electronic invoicing, join us for our April 21st webinar with Sam Knox of CFO Magazine as he reveals his latest research and white paper entitled “The New Deals: Why Companies Are Deepening their Alliances with Customers, Suppliers, and Bankers in a Post-Recession Economy”. You can register for this free webinar at http://www.ariba.com/programs/invoicenow/

 

 

Is AP automation changing the way you work, and improving your company’s business performance?  Share your experiences and let’s continue the dialogue.

January is behind us, and your hectic year-end close is now a distant memory.  As for me, well, I’m just getting around to publishing my first blog post of 2011.

 

Today’s discussion centers around executing plans for 2011. The challenges are very familiar to us all: getting the most from an already stretched AP budget, and assessing options for automating AP. In conversations with my peers in AP or when working with new AP organizations, I hear the same questions over and over. How do I get started?  What results can I expect?  

 

To begin to answer these questions, it makes good sense to learn from the success of others. At Ariba, many of our customers and AP Professionals are finding great value from converting paper invoices to an electronic format with Ariba Invoice Conversion Services—what many consider a "jump start" to AP automation.

 

With this approach, you eliminate the cumbersome day-to-day processing of paper invoices. Your paper invoices are converted to an electronic format, and delivered to the Ariba network along with your electronic invoices. The result? You can manage all your invoices from one location. Your AP staff becomes more efficient, get cost reductions, and have more time to focus on value-added activities.

 

But don’t take my word for it. Hear from RockTenn in our February 17 webinar, Beyond Scanning and Workflow: Can You Achieve 100% Paperless Processing in Account Payable?

 

Meanwhile, are any of you planning to move more invoices to electronic this year? Let me know the steps you are taking, and the main drivers of your business case.   

 

Looking forward to a great 2011,

Kerry Ann

Once again, we have reached the end of a busy year, and the holidays are upon us. However, for those who work in or with Accounts Payable organizations, we know the the end of year poses many challenges.....most of them revolve around processing the mountains of paper invoices that arrive in 4th quarter.

 

In PayStream Advisors Q3 Technology Insight report, finds that even now in 2010, that 60% of Accounts Payable organizations still receive the majority of their invoices in paper format. And as we know in Accounts Payable we transform ourselves into invoice elves and try to locate invoices from the desks of our colleagues and process and post those invoices before the bell tolls for the new year. For the six years I worked in Accounts Payable, New year's eve was not a time to celebrate but a time to finally get some sleep, now that the invoice processing was complete.

 

The good news is, based on PayStream Advisors Q3 Technology Insight report, 40% of organizations have an electronic invoicing plan in 2010. So, let's get the AP elves processing those paper invoices for this this year, and realize the dream of having enough time and funding to emerge into the world of eCommerce and reduce the paper invoice mountain in 2011!

 

So, does your AP organization have an eInvoicing plan for 2011?  Or are more paper invoices in your future?

Filter Blog

By author: By date:
By tag: