How To Simplify The Accounts Payable Reconciliation Process

Your company’s ability to deliver to your customers depends on smooth accounts payable processes — especially reconciliation.

What does that mean, exactly? Well, reconciliation of accounts payable helps take care of things like missing payments, payment disputes, and payment discounts. When reconciliation is done right, it keeps operations humming along and your suppliers happy — both of which put respect on your name. As good as your reconciliation process might be though, Teamstand can make it even better by delivering important files to where your account execs are already working.

Your accounts payable records show what you know at the moment. Because there can be a lot of financial unknowns, these records might not always be on point. If payment was supposed to be sent to Company A, but the wrong keystroke or mouse click sent it to Company B. Whomp, whomp… 

Fortunately, reconciliation can help to fix the mistake. If it’s done quickly, which Teamstand can help with, your suppliers won’t get frustrated and your company won’t look less-than-professional.

We’re sure your company is doing all kinds of unique, cool things for your customers, but even the most unique companies — Teamstand included — should follow a typical reconciliation process that is based on their purchase cycle.

Typical Steps for Accounts Payable Reconciliation

Every company is different and your company’s accounts payable reconciliation process is probably different from the one down the street. That being said, the typical process can be simplified into four steps:

• Request statements. The first step is to contact all your suppliers and request their statements. Teamstand can help a lot with this step by automatically sorting supplier statements by company as they arrive in your inbox.
• Check accuracy. Supplier statements must then be compared to accounts payable records to check for any discrepancies. If the statements match your records, this entire process just got smoother than a BTS song about churned milk. Payments can be made or accounts can be credited. If statements and records do not match, any issues need to be reconciled. This is another area where Teamstand can add a lot of value by making it easy to find and compare documents.
• Review documents. Wouldn't it be nice if there were never any discrepancies between statements and your own records? Unfortunately, that isn't always the case. To fix any issues with a supplier, you need to compare invoices, purchase orders, and other statements from your ERP system to the information listed on the supplier statement. These comparisons can be done easily and electronically, using Teamstand to quickly find the files you need.
• Get clarity. If your document review doesn’t fix the problem, take a tip from Justin Bieber and get that info straight from the source. (He gets his peaches down in Georgia, after all.) Contact the supplier over e-mail and attach any invoices or statements that you can’t reconcile. Teamstand can help you quickly organize and attach the files you need by sender to help you track down your contacts at the supplier.

Common Issues Related to the Accounts Payable Reconciliation Process

Anyone who has worked in accounts payable will tell you that all kinds of issues can come up. However, there are a few pretty common ones that we gotta talk about:

• Slow processing. If your company is working with many different suppliers and vendors, it's easy to fall behind on processing. Teamstand can help your accounts payable team save hours a week and avoid falling behind.
• Mismatching records. Discrepancies happen pretty often in accounts payable and they can take a lot of time to resolve. The most common errors are data entry errors and missing information. Being able to quickly locate files can help you fix these kinds of issues quickly.
• Unauthorized purchases. People in accounts payable often waste time due to purchases made without authorization, typically from unauthorized suppliers or through the unauthorized use of company credit cards.
• Missing invoices. Your accounts payable department is usually swimming in invoices and it's easy for them to go missing. An automated organization tool like Teamstand can prevent this from happening.
• Payment mistakes. From paying an invoice before services are rendered to making a double payment, payment errors happen pretty often. Staying organized can help you avoid sending out more money than you need to.

Use Teamstand to Level Up Your Accounts Payable Reconciliation

Tired of an accounts payable reconciliation process that’s slow and prone to mistakes? Teamstand automates the organization of digital assets in Gmail, Google Workspace and Slack to make file-finding a cinch. Many Accounts Payable Managers using the tool have shaved hours each week off their reconciliation process.

Available as a Chrome extension, our app presents sorted lists of important files in a collapsible panel within Gmail, bringing critical assets to where you’re already working. Like the best apps, it’s intuitive and simple. Contact us today to get free access to Teamstand’s automated digital filing finding cabinet.