How to Effectively Outsource Accounts Payable?

So you have made a decision to outsource your accounts payable services – what now?

How can you ensure the change is a smooth one and offers the preferred efficiency, profits and financial returns on your investment?

Possessing several years of experience helping businesses with this process, there are numerous factors, which could have an impact on whether this change to an outsourced model gets results or not.

Listed below are 6 points to help ascertain your company minimizes the risks and effectively outsources its accounts payable services:

1. Decide on Your Outsourcing Service Provider Cautiously

Spend some time in checking their referrals. Speak with their present clients straightaway, as opposed to counting on website’s success stories.

2. Transparency is Important

Make sure that you along with your accounts payable in-house team have total accessibility and perceptibility to every process. Your colleagues are going to assist you as long as they are able to access any kind of invoice and comprehend straight away its processing status, the processing history and the designated team associate.

3. Pay a Visit to the Outsourcing Company, if possible

It truly is worthwhile to take a trip overseas to meet the people you are likely to collaborate with. Take the opportunity to get acquainted with them and have an understanding of their strong points, downsides and the best way to correspond with them. Building this partnership will benefit you and them to realize success. Pay attention to how the company employees are cared for and verify evenhanded work procedures. Working with a “dodgy” company may possibly harm your company’s credibility and even its net profit.

4. Set KPIs

Prior to making the shift to an outsourced accounts payable service, take note of your present capabilities to set up a benchmark. This consists of the number of invoices processed per person, error rate, and one-time transactions and so on. Subsequently, establish equivalent KPIs for the accounts outsourcing company. This will assist you to evaluate the accomplishment of the accounts payable service provider, according to “before and after” reports, and not emotion.

5. Employee Involvement

It usually takes time for the in-house staff to adapt to a change in plan. The most convenient way to handle the change would be to involve your accounts payable in-house staff. Request their input; involve them in educating the outsourced AP team or generating documentation and resources. They will feel appreciated and in many instances derive benefit from their expertise. Think about providing an incentive or perk to keep the staff motivated. Make sure that your in-house team is updated about each and every phase of the process. Trying to keep the decision to outsource accounts payable undisclosed can cause unrest and mistrust.

6. Disaster Recovery

Last but not least, make sure you have a contingency strategy if anything goes amiss. Create a precise SLA, which you can fall back on. Some thought ought to be paid to backup and disaster recovery arrangements along with immediate alternatives if the outsourcing service provider goes offline.

Also Read: Boost Your Bottom Line by Outsourcing Accounts Payable

Are you having any queries regarding outsourcing AP services? We can easily assist you in providing outstanding customer experience whilst making your complete operations more potent.