Fintech & Finance Operations// topic
Invoice to pay: capture, matching and approvals
In short
Everything between an invoice arriving and money leaving: how documents get captured, how lines get matched to a PO or contract, which checks run before approval, and what an exceptions-first queue looks like when only the genuinely odd invoices reach a human.
9 pages
diagnostics
- Invoices sit in approval for days: find the hop where it diedStop chasing approvers and start aging the hop. Time-in-hop, the resolved principal and the notification result identify the stall in minutes, and four of the five causes are configuration rather than behaviour.diagnostic11 min
- Matching fails because the goods receipt has not been posted yetAn exception that resolves itself if left alone for two days is not a receipting failure. Measure the site's receipting lag, then let the system wait instead of a person.diagnostic10 min
- The invoice quantity is right and the match fails: unit-of-measure driftThe extraction is right, the totals reconcile, and the line still fails on quantity. When the ratio between the two quantities is a clean pack multiple, nobody is over-billing you.diagnostic10 min
- The same invoice got paid twice: finding the near-duplicate your check missedThe exact-match check passed because the second document differed in one of the three fields it compares. Five ways one bill becomes two, the fuzzy key that catches each, and where the sweep belongs.diagnostic11 min
- Your exception queue is growing: it is a defect list, not a headcount gapA queue that grows faster than it clears is almost never evenly spread. Pivot it by exception type against supplier and entity, and a handful of cells will be carrying most of the volume.diagnostic10 min
definitions
- Non-PO invoices: what an automated flow can match them against insteadNo purchase order means no agreed quantity, price or delivery to join against. Four substitute commitments, in order of strength, and what each one lets a system clear.definition7 min
- The vendor master record: the fields that decide whether an invoice can be automated at allSix field groups, four fields almost nobody has, and the reason one supplier ends up as five rows. Most AP automation failure is a vendor master problem wearing a matching costume.definition9 min
- Three-way matching: the documents, and the fields the join runs onThe purchase order, the goods receipt and the invoice each assert something different. Matching them is a join on 8 fields, and every one is a place it can fail.definition6 min
- Tolerance rules: what a matching engine is allowed to wave throughOne global percentage leaks on high-value lines and screams on low-value ones. A usable tolerance carries a basis, a direction, a percentage-and-absolute pair, a supplier override and a cumulative cap.definition10 min
Other topics in Fintech & Finance Operations
See allGetting paid: receivables, cash application and dunningThe other direction of the invoice — how remittances get matched to open invoices, how collections outreach gets sequenced without wrecking the customer relationship, and where credit limits, disputes and short payments get decided.5 pagesLending: application, decision and the loan book after itThe full credit lifecycle as software — pulling borrower data out of documents, computing the ratios, clearing underwriting conditions by rule, and then servicing, arrears and recovery once the loan is live.4 pages
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