Freight Bill Automation Solutions

Overview of Certuspact's Freight Bill Automation Approach

Companies that move through the normal successful business maturing process can find themselves at a point in time where tried and tested manual procedures can no longer process invoices fast enough to meet payment terms, while also ensuring they have been billed correctly. Along with this challenge is the added requirement to receive freight accrual and freight spend reports within a compressed time frame. Invariably little to no financial or technological investment was made for the freight bill process to keep pace with the increased volume of freight invoices that the company handles. A manual invoice review process might be effective but not necessarily efficient, resulting in increased freight bill processing costs and delays in relevant reports. These costs generally manifest themselves in higher wage costs, other invisible costs and a deterioration of the relationship with the trade partner. A basic freight bill automation process would consist of receiving the invoice, rating the invoice, resolving discrepancies on the invoice, approving the invoice, performing a general ledger allocation, paying the invoice and preparing various reports on the invoices processed. Certuspact has automated the components of the freight bill process. The information below describes how these processes will benefit the customer and be made more efficient and effective, allowing a company to regain control of the freight invoice process, while building stronger relationships with their trade partners.

Certuspact Controls Freight Costs

Certuspact considers the most over looked element in freight spend to be the inherent cost of processing a freight invoice. In order to maintain or control freight costs, an organization must have a defined and repeatable freight bill automation process in place. Research has indicated that when companies employ a freight bill automation process, that, apart from a probable saving or reduction of freight spend, there is a decrease in freight invoice process cost and time. Some research has indicated, under certain conditions, it is possible to see a decrease of 8.8% in freight spend. Depending on which report you read and what level of automation is currently in place with an organization, the invoice process costs can vary between $3.50 and $35.00. Depending on the level of automation in place, the time it takes to process an invoice can vary between 4 and 27 days.

Cost components of manual freight invoice processing 39K

Certuspact is Scalable

Certuspact's freight bill automation process allows for an increase of freight invoice volumes with little or no additional setup requirements. Certuspact recognizes that simple elements in the process, such as charge descriptions, can have a major impact on the scalability of similar processes. Certuspact addresses these challenges uniquely, allowing customers to manage their charge descriptions which could, for example, impact the rating of the charge as well as general ledger allocations. Utilizing and correcting data at the source allows for an increase in data consistency and integrity.

Certuspact is Flexible

Certuspact gives customers the option of using the most basic service to more complex and diverse services. As the client becomes more familiar with the system and processes, additional features can be added. Furthermore, the system can expand across organizations, locations, users, transportation modes, products, and geographies. Certuspact also supports customer defined hierarchies as a solution for reporting purposes on a global basis.

Certuspact Provides Visibility

Accurate and timely freight spend information is of paramount importance to business owners. They want to know their global spend, up until the night prior, today. Based on the customers' selected setup options, Certuspact can provide customers with complete visibility of their global freight spend. Collaboration between the customer and their trade partner is and will always be important. The processing status and audit trail of an invoice will be visible to all relevant parties simultaneously. A customer can also redirect trade partner queries, with regard to an invoice status, to the application for a detailed status update.

Certuspact Supports Transaction Control

Due to regulatory financial requirements, it's important in today's business environment that businesses can provide evidence showing they are in control of their transactions. With Certuspact's online and security-enhanced service, it is easier for customers to meet their responsibility to provide such evidence. Additionally, customers and trade partners have access to review audit trails of invoices processed, approved, or rejected. Document images for a particular invoice can be added online within the application as additional support or a specific customer requirement before invoice approval.

Distinguishing System Features

Certuspact considers the most distinguishing feature of the application to be the ability for users to make corrections on their invoice, in order to meet a customer's rule or requirement. Another unique feature is the availability of the audit trail within the invoice. The audit trail displays what action was required, what action was taken by which user and what date and time the action was performed. Users will also have the option to enter notes to an invoice. The third feature worth mentioning is the ability to upload document images to the application either as a customer requirement or, for example, to substantiate a particular claim of a pass through charge. Users can also resolve an issue on an invoice within the application. There is no longer a need to phone, fax or e-mail to resolve an invoice issue.

The freight forwarding industry has many challenges and Certuspact has developed unique solutions to address these challenges. Visit our Services page for more information.