Minimizing Boredom and Maximizing Productivity with Accounts Payable Automation

Boredom is an issue in the workplace, even for the most dedicated or driven employee. Some tasks simply aren’t interesting. When you must complete many of those tasks—or tackle the same work every single day—it’s no surprise that the mind may start to wander. When that happens, work slowdowns. Errors increase. Job satisfaction declines, and a vicious cycle can begin. When that happens in work such as accounts payable, the business can experience real cost impacts. Could accounts payable automation be the solution?

In many cases, the answer is a resounding “yes.” Better automation can increase job satisfaction for workers while delivering critical advantages for the business as a whole. With advanced automation platforms from Kofax and ready-to-use solutions and support for those platforms on the Kofax Marketplace, you can tackle the issue of boredom while equipping your business for success.

How Automation Helps Alleviate Boredom

More than a few of the tasks in accounts payable are tedious and time-consuming. Manually extracting information from an invoice, for example, might mean typing the same information into different systems two or three times. Matching invoices to purchase orders is similar. There are many steps to each process, but minimal variation in the work required. Only rarely are there exceptions that might require more in-depth handling.

For human workers, these conditions create boredom by their very nature. That same nature is what makes them ideal for automation. Both rules-based robotic process automation and AI-powered cognitive document capture tools can play a role here. By doing so, you begin unlocking many benefits—and it’s simple to get started, too.

Increase Accuracy Through Automation

Extracting information from paperwork is one of the most time-consuming tasks in AP. With platforms such as TotalAgility and Kofax RPA, you can streamline this process using add-ons such as the Microsoft Document Intelligence engine. This power OCR tool can provide highly accurate extraction even from complex paperwork combined with intelligent tools.

Better extraction ensures higher accuracy so that staff don’t have to face the mind-numbing task of repeatedly switching between an invoice and a data entry program. Human workers instead focus on handling exceptions in the process, clarifying data for accuracy when necessary while the automated work continues.

Increase Team Productivity and Drive Down Overall Costs

Bored teams don’t work as quickly or efficiently. That could mean that your accounts department doesn’t process invoices promptly, which in turn drives up the associated costs. Reducing cost-per-invoice and processing time benefits your business in multiple ways. Using transcend AP for TotalAgility offers a solution that makes such goals achievable.

Capable of supporting workflows including document data extraction, 2-way and 3-way matching of invoices with POs and receipts and automated payment, this is an end-to-end solution. Enjoy enhanced visibility into the status of every invoice in the system while clamping down on unnecessary spending. You can achieve all this while empowering employees to do more in their day. As costs come under control and the number of invoices processed increases, so too may you see an improvement in team morale.

More Capably Detect Fraud

Accounts payable can be an area of vulnerability for companies without sufficient oversight. There is potential for bad actors to misdirect funds or steal from the business. Automation both removes some of these opportunities and helps detect them through thorough audit logging. However, you can use automation solutions to do more, too. For example, the AI Document Fraud Detection solution from Kofax Labs uses advanced machine learning to detect when documents don’t align with the appropriate standards.

Simplify Compliance

Robots can help you meet regulatory obligations or internal governance requirements. Automating invoice approvals may ensure that your business can meet its obligations faster while also routing exceptional or high-value invoices to an authority for approval. Additionally, there are other ways that automation might aid compliance.

For example, consider the VAT Auditor by VATCalc available on the Kofax Marketplace for interfacing with AP Essentials. In regions where VAT is mandatory, incorrectly applying the tax rate or missing it altogether can be a serious problem. For human workers, it’s yet another step in a long process. Instead, this tool automatically identifies potential issues and makes it simpler to calculate the appropriate amount. When the alternative is potential underpayment or overpayment, an automated solution is an ideal fit.

Discover More About How Your Teams Benefit From Automation Today

Accounts payable automation can be a potent tool for transforming the way you work—and changing how your AP staff approach their work. With the opportunity to focus more time on problem-solving and creative work, teams can enjoy coming to work again. Simultaneously, your business enjoys the advantages of faster processing, fewer errors, and positive financial impacts. Choose today to start learning more about Kofax tools, such as AP Essentials and the Marketplace solutions that make adoption and deployment even simpler.