Driving Dealership Success: Mastering Invoice Automation

Imagine a dealership where every day begins with a flood of invoices—papers stacked high, emails overflowing, and crucial details lost in the shuffle. For many dealerships, this scenario isn’t just a challenge—it’s a costly reality. 

Managing invoices is a universal challenge for dealerships. Most processes are highly manual, heavily paper-driven, and time-consuming, costing an average of $13 or more per paper invoice. The reason for this high cost? Labor.  

The manual steps involved in data entry, verification, routing, and approvals can drive costs up to $40 per invoice. However, the financial impact goes beyond labor expenses. Errors in data entry, missing line items, and pricing discrepancies can cost upwards of $50 per invoice to rectify, causing significant delays and bottlenecks. 

Let’s dive into why managing invoices manually is so expensive, exploring not only the hidden costs but also the comprehensive benefits of automation.  

The Hidden Costs of Manual Invoice Management 

• Error Rectification: Mistakes in manual processing, such as missing data or pricing discrepancies, are not just costly but also time-consuming to fix. These errors can cost between $30 and $50 per invoice, contributing to significant financial drains. 
• Lack of Visibility and Control: Manual processes often lead to poor tracking of invoices and purchase orders (POs). This lack of visibility can cause poor cash flow management and frequent holdups, frustrating both staff and vendors. 
• Vendor Relationship Strain: Delays in invoice processing can lead to late payments, damaging crucial vendor relationships and disrupting supply chains. Automation ensures timely payments, preserving these essential relationships. 

Did you know? "Businesses that pay their invoices on time due to automation report a 30% improvement in vendor satisfaction and relationships." - Ardent Partners' "Accounts Payable Metrics that Matter in 2021" report. 

Simplifying the Invoice Lifecycle with Automation 

To address these challenges, dealerships are increasingly turning to automation to streamline the complete invoice lifecycle, from buyer to supplier. Here’s how automation modernizes invoice management: 

1. Intelligent Data Capture: Automated tools like Optical Character Recognition (OCR) swiftly capture invoice details, transferring both headers and line-items directly into the system. Many solutions claim high accuracy, but OCR can sometimes be a pain point. This is where intelligent learning systems come into play. They adapt to your business over time, ensuring accuracy. Additionally, having an extra layer of support with a team that monitors and corrects errors ensures the reliability of your data. 
2. Document Management: Once documents are captured via OCR, email, or other methods, they are stored in a searchable document management system. This system centralizes all critical documents, including POs, invoices, credit/debit memos, packing slips, journal entries, and work orders, making retrieval easy and efficient. 
3. Automatic Matching and Exception Handling: For PO-based invoices, automation can eliminate the need for manual intervention by automatically matching invoices to POs using either 2-way or 3-way matching. 

• • 2-Way Matching: Compares the invoice received from a vendor with the corresponding purchase order. The system checks key elements such as item descriptions, quantities, and prices to ensure accuracy and completeness.
  • 3-Way Matching: Adds a third document, the order receipt, to the comparison process. This confirms receipt or delivery of goods/services against both the PO and the invoice, flagging discrepancies like incorrect quantities or damaged goods for review. 
  • Exception Handling: When discrepancies are identified, the system flags them for human review and routes them appropriately. Established workflows guide the resolution process, ensuring all exceptions are handled efficiently.
    

The Comprehensive Benefits of Invoice Automation 

Here’s how automation goes beyond cost savings to deliver substantial benefits:  

1. Efficiency Gains: Automation reduces invoice processing times dramatically, from days to hours. Tasks that once required manual intervention, such as data entry and validation, are now handled swiftly and accurately by automated systems. 
2. Improved Accuracy: By automatically validating data across multiple documents—POs, invoices, receipts—automation minimizes errors that can lead to costly discrepancies. This ensures that billing is accurate and compliant with regulatory requirements. 
3. Enhanced Compliance: Automation systems enforce compliance with internal policies and external regulations seamlessly. This reduces the risk of penalties and audits, providing peace of mind to dealership management and stakeholders. 

DocuPhase: Setting a New Standard 

DocuPhase offers a comprehensive suite of solutions designed to close the loop on the invoice-to-pay process. Whether you’re looking to digitize your process-critical documents or fully automate matching and approvals, DocuPhase provides the tools and support needed to transform your dealership’s invoice management. 

• Enhanced Accuracy and Reliability: DocuPhase stands out by offering intelligent learning that adapts to your business over time, ensuring high accuracy. Additionally, DocuPhase provides an extra layer of support with a team that monitors and corrects errors, ensuring the reliability of your data. 

• Centralized Document Management: All documents are stored in a centralized, searchable system, making it easy to track and retrieve any necessary paperwork, therefore improving visibility and control over your processes. 

• Streamlined Workflows: Automated matching and exception handling streamline workflows, allowing your team to prioritize high-value tasks over manual processing. 

By leveraging DocuPhase’s automation solutions, dealerships can significantly reduce the costs associated with manual invoice processing, improve accuracy, and enhance vendor relationships. In an industry where efficiency and reliability are key, invoice automation is not just an option but a necessity for staying competitive. 

Ready to streamline your dealership’s invoice processes? Request a demo today and take the first step towards a more efficient and profitable dealership.