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Technology continues to disrupt various industries with its advancements and innovations. In recent years, there’s been a lot of buzz surrounding automation in business processes. Automation is one of the newest trends that’s already revolutionizing business operations.
By automating various mundane yet important tasks, companies are able to reap numerous benefits, such as improve overall efficiency, reduce costs, reduce the chances of human error, save time, streamline entire processes and so on. That’s why automation is becoming integrated into various business operations, including financial processes.
When it comes to business success, managing finances is of the utmost importance. Crucial processes, such as managing cash flow, accounts receivable, accounts payable, taxes and others, simply cannot suffer mistakes. Otherwise, your company is at risk of ending up in a lot of financial problems that may even result in business failure. Fortunately, automation can greatly help your company in avoiding such mistakes. Therefore, here are a few financial processes you should automate.
Accounts receivable
One of the financial processes any business should automate is accounts receivable (AR). AR represents how a company generates revenue and profits by getting paid by their clients or customers. For instance, billing clients or customers for your products or services via invoices is considered AR. When it comes to invoices, AR automation is essential.
The main reason is that tracking invoices that are paid, nearing their due date or overdue is difficult to do manually. What’s more, invoices can take between 30 and 120 days until they’re due, and any missed or late payments may seriously hurt your company’s cash flow. With automation, you can easily track all your invoices and also schedule reminder letters to customers or clients who are late.
Accounts payable
Accounts payable (AP) represent a company’s expenses. AP includes expenses, such as bills, taxes, salaries and others, as well as company debt that’s owed to suppliers and creditors, such as banks. These expenses have a time frame in which they must be paid, in order to prevent default.
In other words, a company must pay its dues to avoid additional debt, penalties, legal issues or fees. Once again, automation can greatly help a company out in this scenario. You can schedule and automate payments to be made as soon as it’s required and ensure that your dues are paid in time and in full. That way you avoid any unnecessary debt that may result from late or missed payments.
Payrolls
It’s no secret that the payroll process is quite daunting for many companies. Aside from making sure you pay your employees on time and ensure that the taxes are paid as well, there are additional costs and the waste of paper checks. What’s more, a company must make an effort to gather data, process information and create reports for each payroll. However, by automating the payroll process you can streamline it and make it completely seamless.
You can even automate the electronic fund transfer and ensure that salaries are transferred directly to an employee’s reliable payroll card. That way, you provide employees with a convenient way to get paid while your company can cut down on additional expenses. Moreover, with payroll automation, you can ensure that any relevant information, such as tax obligation, salary amounts and other data are always up to date, thus minimizing the possibility of errors.
Taxes
Taxes are also part of your company’s accounts payable, but they require more attention. A company’s tax obligations must be taken seriously, in order to avoid hefty fines and legal troubles imposed by the government. Every tax season, finance departments go into overdrive. Your company must ensure that the complete documentation is in order and ready for filing. Furthermore, you must ensure that all the business taxes are paid in time, if nothing else, then at least to avoid excess fees and penalties.
That way you will be certain that the government bureaucracy won’t hinder you in any way and that you’ll get proper tax benefits and returns as well. However, in order to make this process more efficient, you should strongly consider automating it. Not only will automation help your finance department sort out taxes properly and more efficiently, but it will also help ensure that your company will always pay its taxes in time.
Automation is a valuable asset to any company no matter its size. It can help companies save time and resources on both mundane and crucial business tasks. If you implement automation into your business processes properly, your company’s efficiency is bound to improve.