As you deploy new technologies and processes to improve AP automation, what are the essential key performance indicators and metrics to evaluate? More importantly, how does your performance match up to industry benchmarks?
The most relevant core goals for AP automation include enhancing productivity, visibility, and profitability. Yet each represents a different aspect for best-using eInvoicing and discount management solutions to turn your organization into a top performer.
Productivity
One important indicator measures productivity per full-time employee (FTE) – to show how efficient employees are at invoicing. Consider these productivity benchmarks:
- At typical companies the average employee processes between 25,000 and 50,000 invoices per year.
- At top performing companies the average employee processes 50,000 or more invoices per year.
By adopting standardized processes and eInvoicing solutions, you can centralize both invoicing and AP verification procedures to save employee’s time and boost efficiency to gain a higher level of productivity.
Visibility
Visibility on spending delivers added performance because it improves reporting, reduces auditing costs, and eliminates time wasted tracking down documents and taking calls from suppliers. The key metric to evaluate is the level of visibility of spend at each line-item level.
- At average companies, spend visibility at the line-item level is only 38%
- At top performing companies, that percentage rises to 73%
In many cases, multiple legacy systems, ERP’s and other non-integrated systems create poor visibility across the organization. With eInvoicing, however, you can more accurately track incoming invoices – standardizing all of your reporting processes and improving communication across different systems to add visibility.
Profitability
AP automation can make a significant contribution to company profits by capturing early payment discounts more efficiently. In fact, dynamic discounting solutions offer direct financial benefits that exceed any other invoicing initiative.
Companies with large spend levels that take full advantage of early payment programs can earn significant annual savings – with top performing companies saving an average of 11 percent per year on their spending.
Tracking profitability from discounting is yet another essential KPI, which helps you create more alignment between your procurement and finance departments – an essential partnership for success.
