QuickBooks Automation: How Stampli Maximizes Your Investment
A business can invest in QuickBooks and think they’ve solved all of their accounting problems. Then they realize they might need a bit more help.
After all, while QuickBooks is a powerful tool that can help businesses, particularly small and medium-sized companies handle payroll and other basic accounting functions, there are limits to what it can do. Certain functionality still requires manual input, such as data entry of invoices. Real-time data visibility and collaborative tools for accounting teams can lag in certain respects as well.
That’s where QuickBooks automation tools such as Stampli come in. Join us as we explore why solutions like Stampli are must-have QuickBooks add-ons.
Why You Need Comprehensive QuickBooks Automation
As we’ve noted, QuickBooks is a wonderful tool for many businesses. It’s averaged four stars, out of a possible five, through more than 2,500 reviews on the website G2, with a May 2021 reviewer noting, “It’s easy to use. Everything you see and do, just makes sense.”
So why are we talking about augmenting the solution with QuickBooks automation? Here are a few things to consider.
QuickBooks Can’t Run Your AP Department By Itself
QuickBooks arguably does the work of a CPA or Controller for businesses that might not be able to keep one on-staff, such as a small bakery just trying to make payroll on-time and dependent on QuickBooks to make it happen. Even for businesses with small to medium-sized AP departments, QuickBooks can make a difference, retaining and digitizing a wealth of accounting data and functions.
QuickBooks Functionality, Such as Data Entry, is Still Fairly Manual
To be clear, QuickBooks automation exists through the service in some respects, such as in its QuickBooks Online Advanced software.
For instance, it’s possible through QuickBooks Online Advanced to automate workflows to, as QuickBooks notes on its website, “empower growing businesses to reduce the time and money they’d normally spend on processes, such as sending and paying invoices, transactional customer communications, and, perhaps most important, cash flow management.”
That said, AP automation solutions focus on the invoice receipt and approval processes because that’s where most of the pain is felt in terms of laggards. Moreover, AP automation solutions extend functionality for QuickBooks by maintaining current processes and keeping the QB system as the businesses source of truth. In general, QuickBooks remains a fairly manual service. Users won’t get help, for example, with data entry of invoices, either needing to input vendor bills themselves (which accounts payable clerks loathe) or purchase invoice scanning software.
This can be a big issue, with a study by Stampli and AP Now, “Common Invoice Problems: How to Deal With Them” finding that 68% of survey respondents had to perform at least some manual data entry for 95-100% of their invoices. Having a tool that can ease the load for this is useful. QuickBooks, for all of its fine qualities, is not this tool.
Piecemeal AP Automation Isn’t Enough
So perhaps a company thinks it’ll be okay if it can just find an invoice data entry plug-in for QuickBooks, such as invoice scanning software. After all, invoice scanning software is built with optical character recognition (OCR) software that can digitize paper invoices (which far too many vendors still send through the mail.) Invoice scanning software plus QuickBooks will be sufficient, right?
Eh…
The big reason not to only pursue AP automation on a limited piecemeal basis with tools like invoice scanning software is that companies will miss out on all of the other benefits of AP automation. From quicker invoice approvals and B2B payments to data insights and fraud prevention courtesy of AI, there have been vast advances in AP automation in recent years. Cloud-based computing is also making automation far more affordable.
3 Ways QuickBooks Automation Can Bolster AP
For companies that have invested in QuickBooks, AP automation is a logical next step. Here are three ways that QuickBooks automation can lead to more streamlined accounting.
1. It Does the Work that AP Staff Can’t (or Won’t) Do
Let’s face it, there are plenty of tasks that AP workers might not be especially eager to handle – work that QuickBooks won’t be any better suited to take on without an AP automation plug-in, by the way.
Aside from aforementioned reluctance to tackle manual data entry, AP staff might not want to regularly attend to other tedious but vital duties, such as investigating every invoice exception. In fact, one of the largest drivers of AP automation in a 2021 survey report by Stampli and Treasury Webinars, “The How, the Why and the ROI of AP Automation” was a high percentage of invoice exceptions, for approximately 25% of respondents.
In QuickBooks, it might be somewhat cumbersome to respond to an invoice exception and that response might still need to happen manually. This is only because Quickbooks focuses on many processes and has a wealth of functionality, but AP automation can extend this wealth. For example with AP automation, AI tools such as Stampli’s robot, Billy can intuitively resolve many simple exceptions, leaving only the more sophisticated exceptions for humans to review.
2. All-in-One Functionality
Purchase a QuickBooks automation tool like Stampli and companies aren’t just getting a way to process invoices. They’re getting an end-to-end, procurement-to-payment solution that will help with every phase of the accounts payable lifecycle.
It’s not simply invoice capture, which AP automation software can do from the moment a contractor or supplier’s bill reaches a company email inbox. AP automation can also help match said invoice with a purchase order and receipt report, to prove the validity of an invoice. AI and machine learning built into AP automation can scan invoices and literally myriad of others to determine if every detail checks out.
When invoices have been coded and approved within the Stampli system, the integration will automatically create bill records in QuickBooks. The if invoices are paid with Stampli Direct Pay, the integration will automatically create payment records against open bills in QuickBooks.
Beyond this, AP automation’s AI capabilities can also help to glean deeper data insights, such as purchasing trends by different internal departments. Data, in general, has soared in importance for businesses in recent years. QuickBooks automation with a tool like Stampli works to satisfy this growing need.
3. Quicker Approvals
Of course, if AP automation were just about better data and fraud reduction, it might not pencil out. Its primary value proposition, perhaps and what makes QuickBooks automation so necessary is that it can help keep money in the pockets of companies that use it.
Remuneration happens in a few different ways. For one thing, 57% of respondents in Stampli’s 2021 survey found that using AP automation led to faster invoice approval. This can help keep companies from racking up late fees from vendors and also from having to allocate staff time to responding to calls from vendors, wondering where their money is.
Companies using AP automation software are also more likely to net early payment discounts, which can span anywhere from 1-3% but very often go uncollected by companies with manual accounting methods. These discounts particularly help companies during uncertain economic times, with PYMNTS noting in June 2020, “With a lack of financing a growing threat, and more invoices likely to go unpaid, early payment discounts will be a crucial lifeline for small vendors.”
How Stampli Can Strengthen Your QuickBooks Investment
There are a lot of AP automation solutions on the market. Here’s why Stampli is one of the best options for QuickBooks automation.
Easier Data Entry, Courtesy of AI
With Stampli, there’s no moment of silence needed for the AP specialist who had to 10-key 174 invoices into their accounting system before lunch yesterday. There’s no sympathy, either, needed for the unfortunate employee who tried using invoice scanning software but couldn’t decipher the cryptographic figures it spit out.
This is because with Stampli easier data entry happens with the help of the AI bot we mentioned earlier, Billy. This relentless robot revels in capturing invoices as they reach your company, automatically converting and inputting them into your accounting system. Billy can also recognize context and if invoice details are missing that were perhaps in other bills from the same vendor (another thing can hamper manual or OCR data entry.)
A Solution that Can Scale With Your Company
Stampli is built to scale with the companies it serves. The system is constantly evolving, with an ability to dramatically ramp up invoice volume on-demand and user counts as needed. It’s also ERP-flexible, able to switch seamlessly to whatever system a company might implement as it grows.
In addition, it’s payment agnostic with Stampli Direct Pay allowing companies to pay invoices in whichever manner they’re comfortable from ACH to Paper Checks — or outside of Stampli by sending the bill into QuickBooks.
How to Get QuickBooks Automation With Stampli
For companies that are ready for QuickBooks automation, it’s no trouble at all for Stampli to come onboard. Within days, Stampli’s cloud-based AP automation solution can integrate into your existing system, be it QuickBooks Desktop or QuickBooks Online.
We’ll help companies maximize their QuickBooks investment and make them wonder how they ever made do without AP automation.
QuickBooks automation to help you get the most out of your investment. Try Stampli today.
