Increase AP Productivity Using Recurring Invoices

Most businesses have recurring bills such as rent, utilities, and insurance premium payments that must be paid on a regular schedule, whether it is weekly, monthly, quarterly, or any other occurrence. But managing and processing these recurring invoices can be a time-consuming, manual task for any AP department.

Companies that process recurring invoices manually are spending too much time and resources on an inefficient process. Manual invoice processing can:

• Generate more errors, and the AP team must invest more time to correct the errors.
• Produce late or missed payments, which may anger vendors and damage relationships with suppliers. 
• Expose the business to late fees and penalties, and the firm’s credit rating may suffer. 

To help solve these challenges, we’re excited to introduce Recurring Invoices built directly into our industry-leading AP Automation platform. Customers can create various Recurring Invoices for any frequent bill, saving hours of time processing invoices, and speeding up the payment process.

How Automation Improves Invoice Processing

Stampli allows customers to configure a recurring invoice, and automatically generates the invoice based on the customer’s data: 

Configure Recurring Invoices 

You can create any permutation of Recurring Invoices for repeating bills directly in Stampli. Configure the recurring invoices, including data pre-defining invoice fields such as vendor, date, and frequency, add supporting documents, set the frequency or number of occurrences, and more to speed up coding and routing of invoices. 

Once set up, invoices will become immediately available for AP to process, with all predefined fields populated, documents attached, and more. Each recurring invoice will be made available based on the dates entered into Stampli.

Streamline Invoice Coding

Streamline invoice coding by auto-populating invoice fields, removing the manual effort required to code recurring invoices each time a payment is due. Users can adjust data in invoice fields at any time. Supporting documents can be automatically attached to the invoice, making it easy to review the necessary invoice data, and to send off for approval. AP teams still have oversight over the entire process, while using automation to save hours of time.

Built-in flexibility

The Recurring Invoices has the flexibility to meet the requirements of any bill you receive. Say, for example, that a manufacturing company receives three recurring invoices:

• Reliable Maintenance (repair and maintenance on machinery): $500 invoice is paid on 15th of each month, based on a three-year contract with Reliable.
• Superior Electric: The utility bill is due on the last day of each month, and the invoice amount varies, based on electricity usage.
• Midwest Insurance (commercial insurance policy on warehouse): A $1,000 monthly premium is due on the 5th of the month for six months. The insurance company provides a new quote every six months, which changes the monthly premium payments.

With Recurring Invoices, AP teams can build an invoice for each one of these scenarios. When processing these invoices, the coder/routers can always adjust invoice fields when coding an invoice if necessary. For example, the AP team can change the dollar amount of the utility bill each month, and change the monthly insurance premiums when the insurance quote changes. 

Stampli’s solution offers flexibility, and makes it easy for users with the right permissions to complete their tasks at hand.

Consistent invoice processing

Using Stampli’s Recurring Invoice solution does not add any complexity to your AP system. All invoices are processed using a single platform, and you choose how all invoices are paid. Stampli has integrations in place for many ERPs and provides a seamless data sync back to your ERP.

Stampli also provides audit-ready histories of approved bills, including recurring invoices, that are stored in Stampli’s Automation platform, and easily accessed anytime.

Stampli’s Recurring Invoices VS.  ERP’s Reminders Functionality

Some ERPs offer the ability to set up recurring journal entries, recurring invoices, or the ability to write a check on a recurring basis. However, the functionality may not apply to every type of transaction you need to process. 

Stampli, on the other hand, provides a single integrated system for creating an invoice, collecting supporting documentation, and invoice collaboration. Customers process recurring invoices and regular invoices using the same system, and have access to Stampli Card, the only card solution integrated into the most powerful AP Automation platform.

By centering communications on top of the invoice itself, AP departments collaborate and communicate better with approvers, vendors, and any stakeholder involved with purchases, allowing approvals to happen 5x faster.

With Stampli, you don’t need to jump back and forth between tools, which requires more time and increases the risk of errors.

Don’t Just Manage Spend, Control It

Take control over invoice and bill processing with smart, intuitive, and actionable AP Automation. Leverage the power of Recurring Invoices to streamline invoice processing, and to scale your business with less effort. Learn more about Stampli Recurring Invoices, so you can take control of spend.