Most people have played cornhole (also known as bean bag toss) at least once in their life. It’s a fun game, but let’s be honest, there’s not much strategy or skill involved. No matter how much you’ve had to drink or how bad of aim you have, if you keep at it, chances are one of those bean bags will end up in the hole at some point. That’s what I liken many AP departments’ methods for processing invoices to. Companies struggle with streamlining their processes, which tend to be very labor-intensive solely because of the volume of paper involved. At the end of the day, there is no strategy. When an invoice is received, it may be a long, drawn-out process to get it paid, but “eventually it will get paid!”

YOU LOSE EVERY TIME

In cornhole, you are not too focused on how long the game lasts, as someone eventually “wins” at some point. In the paper-based AP process, it’s the opposite. Everyone loses, all the time, no matter what. Sure, you may get all the signatures you need when you print each piece of paperwork, pass it around the office, track it down and file it away in a cabinet, but you lose valuable time in the process! That’s not to mention the additional time you’ll lose if you need to find the “needle in the haystack” later.

PAPERWORK GETS LOST

Walking across the yard to pick up those bean bags is easy, but finding old invoices for internal and external audits isn’t quite as straightforward, even with a seemingly effective filing system. Imagine digitizing the process, where you’d be able to simply Google the documents internally, and find any document, any time, instantly. Now doesn’t that sound nice?

YOU’RE A PROFESSIONAL

There are ways to make a living out of parlor games such as pool and poker, but there are no “professional” cornhole players out there. It’s up to you to establish long-term success and efficiency for your office. It’s literally your job. Otherwise, you become a pro at a game no one truly values. No one ever gets hired or promoted for being able to “excel in a paper-based AP environment.”

THERE’S RISK INVOLVED

Unlike tossing a bean bag around a few times to see what happens, staying “paper-centric” in your office carries a lot of risk. The outcome is delay, poor visibility, loss of control, and wasted resources, not to mention the cost of errors. Roughly 80% of accounting departments are still paper-centric, and in our experience, the main reason why is that people think it’s an “airtight” trail when auditors come knocking. However, digital signatures that have time stamps and include the entire history of the documents are just as legally binding. With the right information management system, your internal documents can be tucked away even more safely and accessed more easily, as opposed to being loosely locked in a filing cabinet.

YOU LOSE TRACK OF TIME

In cornhole, losing track of time is completely enjoyable. But when was the last time losing track of time at work was a good thing? Who enjoys working extra hours to “catch up?” When you digitize your AP process and incorporate dynamic graphical workflows, you have complete visibility into all AP actions. What strategy can you put in place to track a piece of paper? Your chances of getting an accurate read on how long it’s taking for everyone to do their share are zero to none.

Playing cornhole does have one thing in common with going digital in your AP department: it’s easy! Contact us and we’ll help you develop and implement an Automated AP Solution that fits your business’ needs.