In today’s fast-paced business environment, every financial team wants to simplify their operations and streamline processes. This is particularly important for growing organizations, making their accounts payable (AP) and accounts receivable (AR) functions even more complex. When organizations turn to NetSuite to manage their financial operations, specialized applications like SquareWorks Automate and 360 Subscription Billing have some specific insights in gaining efficiency, accuracy and scalability.

Make NetSuite Work for You

As the world’s leading cloud ERP, NetSuite offers a robust foundation for managing complex financial processes. For organizations looking for flexibility, integration and the ability to scale, it is the go-to solution for streamlined operations.

The NetSuite marketplace is one differentiator; various apps, with different functions, specifically designed to work with and enhance the NetSuite experience. Even without these apps, NetSuite features like the GL impact, which lists the impacts of transactions to an organization’s general ledger (GL) accounts, highlight the benefits of using NetSuite, while also bringing to light one of the issues: these functions are only helpful when data being input into NetSuite is accurate and up to date. For companies that are scaling or who have complex requirements for getting their data into their ledgers, these features are even more difficult to take advantage of. Synchronization of data is extremely difficult when NetSuite users are relying on third-party apps; discrepancies and lags in syncing data between systems create risks, complicating operations and often cause delays in real-time reporting.

Organizations with high growth or recurring revenue models are even more suited to AP and AR automation, to ensure efficient cash flow and clean accounting. By automating the mundane and repetitive tasks of AP and AR, employees can in turn focus on more strategic efforts, further improving overall efficiency of the financial team.

In addition to improved data synchronization, seamless applications living within NetSuite aggressively test for updates, a critical component for NetSuite, due to NetSuite releases occurring every six months, if not faster, eliminating the need for custom integrations and frequent testing.

Enhance the User Experience

Creating efficiencies in AP and AR is impossible without automation of the many manual efforts still being undertaken by accounting and financial professionals. NetSuite and native apps will minimize human error and reduce these manual tasks, thereby significantly lessening the constant chaos of month end. This is especially true for invoice approvals, a notoriously slow process often taking 10-15 days and a common cause for delaying month-end close.

Additional integrations like external CRM systems like Salesforce can also speed up the AR process by automating the creation of invoices and processing payments. By creating invoices as fast as possible to begin the AR process and get payments in, businesses can more efficiently track their cash flow.

In order to break down the barriers between finance, technology and strategy with intelligent automation, a single user experience is key. A seamless NetSuite setup, with integrationless applications like SquareWorks Automate and 360 Subscription Billing available—no separate user interfaces, no separate logins, no separate training, all living within the core NetSuite platform.

Manage Complexity and Realize Long-Term Value

The complexities of business operations today mean organizations are relying on applications more than ever to simplify the chaos. These issues often lead companies to search for the perfect solution that can do everything. However, the all-encompassing options are often not the solutions people need for specific AP and AR functions.

The value of NetSuite, paired with NetSuite-native applications like SquareWorks Automate and 360 Subscription Billing to bring efficiency to AP and AR processes, become evident over time. Despite the upfront investment, the ability to automate financial workflows and maximize the potential of the NetSuite platform will result in faster and more accurate financial reporting, enhanced cash flow through AR automation and the ability to scale while needing fewer resources.

This is why investing in verticalized services that bring a thorough understanding of your organization’s specific needs is crucial for getting the most out of your investments. The total cost of ownership ends up reduced, due to the reduced need for IT to handle broken integrations and custom solutions, reducing overhead costs.

Want to simplify your month-end close? Our experts can help.

For more information on how to automate your accounts payable functions, go to https://squareworks.com/automate-ap-automation-suite/

For a deeper dive into how to optimize your accounts receivable functions, sign up for a demo here.