Anoek van der Riet
Corporates regularly pay their invoices late. In fact, one in seven large companies in the Netherlands does not pay more than half of its incoming invoices on time.Main cause? Not economic uncertainty or liquidity problems, but the lengthy approval process.
Less than half of corporates pay virtually all (80 to 100%) incoming invoices on time.This is evident from research among more than 200 finance and procurement professionals conducted by independent market research firm DirectResearch on behalf of ICreative.
Causes of late payment
Although there can be several reasons for late payment of invoices, the survey shows that the main cause is the approval process that takes too long. This approval of invoices is still done manually at a large proportion of corporates. Less than half of the surveyed financials are already dealing with an automatic approval process.
Another frequently cited cause of late payment is the large amount of corrections required in the invoice processing process. The cash policy is mentioned to a lesser extent and emerges as the third reason.
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Still a lot of room for automation
There is clearly much to be gained by corporates when it comes to automation of the purchase-to-pay process. Only 1 percent of professionals surveyed indicated that their organization receives and processes all invoices fully automatically.
Full trend report available for free
Want to learn more about how corporates have structured their purchase to pay process and the implications for Procurement and Finance? Download the full trend report for free.
In it you will read about, among other things:
- To what extent does indirect spend pose a problem for Finance and Purchasing?
- How do purchase orders and invoices come about among Dutch corporates?
- What trends and developments affect Procurement and Accounts Payable?
Anoek
van der Riet
Contents Specialist
Anoek writes daily about purchase to pay, order to cash and Robotic Process Automation. She enjoys diving into topics such as e-invoicing, working capital and hyperautomation.