Benefits of adopting E-Invoicing

- Replacing the physical paper form with a structured digital e form allows the invoice to be handled and archived more efficiently. This provides significant savings in printing, postage, intra-office routing and archiving.
- Making the data machine-readable removes the need for manually viewing and reading a visual form of the invoice. It also removes the manual work of entering the invoice information into an Access Point system. This provides significant savings in human resources and significantly reduces errors in data entry. This cannot be achieved with digital images of the invoice such as pdf.

The Invoice process
1. The seller
prepares the invoice
This step refers to the compiling of information such as man-hours, list of items, usage of
services etc. necessary to issue an invoice. This process happens before the invoice itself is created and is not affected by the form of the invoice.
Source of savings Any automation and
improvement in preparing an invoice is
unrelated to the form of the invoice.
Visual digital invoices NO SAVINGS
Structured data e-Invoice NO SAVINGS
2. The seller issues the invoice
The invoice is created in the system and exported into the relevant format, paper, pdf, HTML, structured XML.
Source of savings
Paper and printing costs and handling of mail.
Visual digital invoices SAVINGS
Structured data e-
Invoice SAVINGS
3. The seller sends the invoice
The invoice that has been created is sent to the buyer according to a certain procedure, i.e. physically, by email or through messaging platforms.
Source of savings In most cases, there are savings in postal costs. These are replaced by electronic transmission costs, which tend to be significantly lower.
Visual digital invoices SAVINGS
Structured data eInvoice SAVINGS
4. The buyer receives the invoice
As an invoice is received by the buyer it needs to be correctly identified as an invoice and
assigned to the correct internal process.
Source of savings
The manual handling is replaced with a semi or fully automated system. Visual digital invoices received by email usually require some manual sorting (although that can be reduced, e.g. by using dedicated mailboxes). The structure of the data in a structured eInvoice allows for full automation of the reception.
Visual digital invoices LIMITED SAVINGS
Structured data eInvoice SAVINGS
5. The buyer approves the invoice
The invoice is reviewed to verify that it matches the quantities and prices ordered and received.
Source of savings
The review process consists of comparing the invoice to existing information, such as orders, or to apply decision rules. The internal routing of a visual digital invoice can be improved by using document sharing systems (scanning solutions) while the use of structured e-Invoice content enables automated invoice matching. Invoice automated approval frequently provides the buyer with significant benefits by freeing up employees’ time, who tend to be on a managerial level.
Visual digital invoices LIMITED SAVINGS
Structured data e-Invoice SAVINGS
6. The buyer books the invoice into accounts
The buyer enters the necessary information from the invoice into their accounting system(s) and assigns the relevant accounting keys.
Source of savings
Entering of information from visual digital invoices remains manual. Structured eInvoices enable automated information entry and automated assignment of accounting keys through references or rules. Automated entry of invoice information significantly reduces the risk of entry errors which often cause significant costs. This is usually a significant
source of benefits for the buyer.
Visual digital invoices NO SAVINGS
Structured data e-Invoice SAVINGS
7. The buyer schedules payment
The payment for the invoice is scheduled either according to contracted terms or based on payment information in the invoice.
Source of savings
When the time-to-payment is based on the invoice content, as opposed to contractual terms, the structured eInvoice allows for automated entry of the relevant information. This improves payment scheduling and avoids late payments.
Visual digital invoices NO SAVINGS
Structured data e-Invoice SAVINGS
8. The buyer archives the invoice
The invoice is stored for later retrieval.
Source of savings
Both visual digital invoices and structured e-Invoices significantly reduce archiving costs through both reduced handling and storage costs.
Visual digital invoices SAVINGS
Structured data e-Invoice SAVINGS
List of key e-Invoicing cost savings
The following list gives an overview of the type of cost that can be saved in different processing steps that are described above.
- Cost of paper
- Printing costs
- Mailing costs
- Manual handling when sending or receiving
- Review and approval of invoices
- Entry of data into ERP systems
- Accounting key assignment
- Balancing (reduced error in data entry)
- Archiving, handling and storage
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