Implementing Accounts Payable Automation: A Step-by-Step Guide for Australian Businesses

A clear Accounts Payable process makes finances easy and sets the stage for stronger controls, faster approvals, and cleaner books. Automation adds even more value by giving teams real-time visibility, better accuracy, and a smoother payment cycle. Cloud-based automation tools can be rolled out quickly, but rushing often leads to gaps later. A solid workflow foundation helps you implement each stage with confidence and get the best return on your investment.

This guide walks you through the steps, showing how to set up a well-structured accounts payable automation process that supports long-term efficiency.

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What Is Accounts Payable Automation?

Accounts Payable Automation refers to the use of advanced accounting software to streamline and digitise its process. It minimises manual work by automating tasks like invoice capture, data extraction and validation, approval routing, payment processing, and reconciliation. By eliminating repetitive steps, AP automation enhances accuracy, boosts efficiency, and ensures faster, more reliable financial operations.

Step-by-Step Process to Implement Accounts Payable Automation

The automation process begins with an accounts payable specialist assessing the current workflow and defining clear goals. This is followed by choosing AP automation software, integrating it with existing systems, capturing data, and configuring approval workflows.

After that, train AP staff and vendors before moving to the final stage, which is to monitor, optimise, and scale the process. Below are the proper steps to follow:

Step 1: Assess Your Current AP Workflow

Begin by reviewing how invoices move through your finance environment. This helps you pinpoint where exceptions accumulate, where coding mistakes occur, and where approvals slow everything down. Once the full workflow is mapped against standard accounts payable practices, it becomes easier to identify the areas accounts payable automation should strengthen.

Step 2: Define Clear AP Automation Goals

Move from assessment to goal setting by outlining the outcomes your team wants to achieve. Many business owners want to achieve reducing cycle times, improve audit readiness, or cut down manual touchpoints. When these goals are linked directly to day-to-day needs, they create a clear direction for how the AP automation setup should be configured.

Step 3: Choose the Right AP Automation Software

With defined goals, shift your attention to selecting a platform suited to your invoice volume and compliance needs. Look for cloud-based accounting software that connects well with your existing system and supports GST requirements. Features such as machine learning capture, structured approvals, and secure payment options in accounts payable automation software help you manage both current workloads and plan future growth.

Some of the most popular accounts payable automation software includes:

• Volopay
• SAP Concur
• Hubdoc
• QuickBooks Online
• Bills.com

Step 4: Integrate With Your Existing Accounting System

After choosing the platform, focus on building a clean integration with your accounting system. This ensures your chart of accounts, supplier records, and payment workflows stay consistent across both tools. When the sync is reliable, your team spends less time correcting data and more time managing strategic tasks.

Step 5: Digitise Supplier Invoices and Data Capture

Once integration is in place, start converting all incoming invoices into structured digital data. OCR and AI validation tools reduce manual entry and improve coding accuracy. Cleaner data also supports faster reconciliations and a smoother month-end close for the finance team.

Step 6: Configure Approval Workflows and Payment Rules

With digitised inputs ready, set up approval paths based on spend limits, cost centres, and contract conditions. These workflows keep invoices moving without unnecessary delays. Clear payment rules also ensure disbursements align with cash-flow plans and supplier terms, helping your team maintain stronger financial control.

Step 7: Test and Validate the System

When workflows are set, move into testing using real invoices from different scenarios. This confirms that coding, routing, and exception handling behave as expected. Fixing issues during this stage builds confidence before the system becomes part of daily AP operations.

Step 8: Train Your AP Team and Vendors

After successful testing, introduce training so your AP staff can use the system naturally during routine work. Offer guidance for suppliers as well, especially around preferred formats and submission methods. Clear instructions reduce onboarding issues and help everyone adapt quickly.

Step 9: Monitor, Optimise, and Scale

Once the system is live, monitor key metrics such as cycle times, error patterns, and approval delays. Small adjustments often deliver fast improvements. When the workflow becomes stable, expand automation into additional entities or more complex AP categories to keep building efficiency over time.

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Key Benefits of Automating Your Accounts Payable Functions

Automation of accounts payable process offer benefits such as increased efficiency, better supplier relationships, cost reduction, fraud prevention, improved accuracy, data integrity, and improved visibility and transparency. Let us shed light on these benefits in details:

Increased Efficiency

Automated accounts payable cuts down manual handling and speeds up invoice turnaround, which means teams can shift from repetitive data entry to higher-value work without interruptions. This level of AP automation increases ROI, keeps workflows moving smoothly across departments, and ensures processing stays consistent even as volumes rise.

Better Supplier Relationships

With efficiency improving, paying suppliers on time becomes far easier because approvals no longer get stuck in manual loops. This steady, predictable processing helps avoid payment disputes, allowing vendors to feel more confident working with a business that stays organised and pays reliably.

Cost Reduction

Stronger supplier trust aligns with lower costs. Accounts payable automation removes labor-heavy tasks that inflate admin overhead and slow processes. Digital workflows cut duplicated effort, unnecessary follow-ups, and avoidable errors, saving time, reducing operating costs, and eliminating the need to hire more employees.

Better Fraud Prevention

These cost benefits are reinforced by improved protection against fraud, thanks to automated approvals, audit logs, and restricted access running quietly in the background. Suspicious invoices are flagged early, and multiple checks in each workflow make it harder for fraudulent activity to slip through unnoticed.

Improved Accuracy

With tighter fraud controls in place, accuracy also strengthens with accounts payable automation. Clean data capture reduces common input errors, while automated matching between invoices, purchase orders and receipts cuts discrepancies. Finance teams spend fewer hours fixing mistakes and can rely on consistently correct figures.

Data Integrity

Accurate data naturally supports stronger record of integrity. Automated systems store documents in structured formats, preventing information from being scattered across emails or desks. Complete audit trails reduce the risk of lost or altered data and keep records consistent over time.

Increased Data Visibility and Transparency

Real-time dashboards give teams a clear view of invoice status, approvals, and outstanding items, while leaders can track workloads and spending patterns instantly. This transparency supports improved decision-making and keeps financial operations more predictable.

How Outsourcing Accounts Payable Drives Efficiency and Cost Savings

Outsourcing accounts payable gives businesses a tighter, faster, and more predictable way to manage vendor payments without stretching internal teams. With specialists handling invoice capture, validation, approvals, and payment scheduling, the process becomes smoother and far less error prone. The overall impact is simple: fewer delays, lower processing costs, and a finance function that runs with far more discipline.

Whiz Consulting supports businesses with end-to-end accounts payable services backed by skilled accountants, streamlined workflows, and AI-driven tools that keep your payables accurate and timely. From invoice processing to payment management, our team handles the heavy lifting so you can focus on growth-focused work. Connect with us to simplify your AP operations and cut unnecessary overhead.