Electronic invoicing (e-invoicing) can reduce costs for both purchasers and suppliers according to Kennametal, the components and materials supplier.
The manager of customer and vendor support services, Dean Hoffman, was recounting the company's transition from paper invoicing to Purchasing.com and championed Kennametal's experience with e-invoicing.
He highlighted how the benefits of bringing in an automating procure-to-pay system saved time and money for both the company and its long list of suppliers.
Mr Hoffman described how the paper-based system was "suffocating our processes" but went on to illustrate that Kennametal brought 58 per cent of its vendors in to use electronic payments within the first three months of deployment, which led to a fall in the company's payment processing costs by 67 per cent.
However, in addition to savings made on the buyers' side, the suppliers who joined the system also saw an increase in speed of payments by 30 per cent.
Mr Hoffman advised other purchasers considering introducing an e-invoice system to start with the most important suppliers, stressing the financial benefits and helping them to integrate the system.
Some 96% of all Kennametal's invoices flow through its Harbor Payments system, now called S2S eInvoice & Pay after Harbor was purchased by American Express in late 2006.
Kennametal works in a range of sectors including aerospace, mining and recycling.
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