AP Outsourcing Case Study – Global Leader in Process Equipment

Background

• Global leader in process equipment solutions processing over 8,000 invoices per month over 20 global locations in North America, Asia, and Europe.
• Paper-­based approval process: Would copy the invoice, send the original to approvers, and wait for invoices to be returned. Lack of visibility into invoice status caused late payments to vendors.
• Client would process PO invoices in their ERP system and rely on the Purchasing department to run a report to resolve any exceptions. They were unable to quantify and measure exceptions to implement process improvements to reduce them.
• The disbursement cycle took about one full week to complete and due to client’s paper-­based process with many invoices on people’s desks it was difficult to capture the value of invoices in
  process extending month end close.

Solution

• Using IQ’s proprietary Archimedes system, client was able to track invoices through the process, subsequently reducing lost or misplaced invoices and reducing rush or late vendor payments.
• IQ developed processing rules and tracking capabilities, using Archimedes, to report on exceptions and gather data to improve the process improvements that reduce the number of exceptions.
• IQ used Archimedes to build a custom accrual extract, allowing client to capture at any time all in-­process invoices for accrual purposes for a rapid month-­end close.
• Using best practices and process efficiencies, IQ cut the disbursement cycle to one day.