Last week I wrote about how “not all deductions were created equal”. The point I was trying to make was specific to the consumer products industry and centered on Trade Promotion Deductions and the fact that they can actually be an efficient form of the financial settlement. This would, however, require a paradigm shift within an organization since most companies look at all “all” deductions as a major problem because of their impact on Receivables.
As a follow-up to last week’s blog, I’d like to discuss in more detail some thoughts on what steps can be taken to improve a company’s overall deduction process.
First, a quick review of the types of deductions is warranted. For the purposes of this discussion, I am lumping the various deductions into 2 major categories. (Does not include Unearned Cash Discounts tied to terms of sale.)
Both of these categories include valid and invalid deductions and both require further analysis to determine validity. The invalid deductions represent “true” receivables and require good documentation to successfully collect from customers. Studies across all industries consistently show that the majority of deductions are valid. As previously noted, Trade Promotion deductions represent the majority of customer deductions both in numbers and even more so in dollars. The rest of this discussion will focus on the overall management of Trade Promotion spending and ways to make the deduction resolution more efficient.
Each one of these areas currently requires a significant amount of manual work for most companies and can be a drain on internal resources. These manual processes also impact the overall cycle time required to resolve and clear deductions.
HighRadius is a recognized leader in helping companies optimize their receivables management. They have recognized all four of these automation opportunities and have partnered with various CPG companies to develop solutions utilizing cloud-hosted Software as a Service (Saas) technology to offer a flexible cost-effective way of automating these processes to significantly improve productivity while reducing costs and cycle time. By recognizing that “one size does not fit all” they have developed a “template” for automation of these processes that can easily be modified to integrate with a company’s current systems, regardless of what platform they are on.
Additionally, they can also work with you to accommodate customer-specific nuances that have often created barriers to automation. The overall cost can often be offset by the savings associated with improved productivity. I encourage you to contact High Radius so they can work with YOU to help identify ways of optimizing your current processes through automation.
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