AP Approvals in Sage Intacct: Issues and Solutions

Effective approval systems are pivotal for sound financial management, yet often, these systems introduce complexity rather than clarity. We'll examine these common obstacles and detail how Kloo's specific features create a more dynamic and responsive approval process within Sage Intacct.

Common Approval Workflow Inefficiencies

Slow Approvals: Systems that aren't intuitive can prolong approval times. These platforms can become a barrier, causing delays that bottleneck procurement operations and slow down the workflow.

Inflexibility in Workflow Configurations: Standard workflows often fail to account for the unique nature of each expense, resulting in a mismatch between the expenditure and the approval process it undergoes.

Disproportionate Workflow Steps: An ideal approval process should reflect the importance and size of the expenditure, avoiding both excessive steps for small transactions and insufficient steps for larger ones.

Optimising AP Approvals for Sage Intacct

Kloo addresses these inefficiencies with features designed to create intuitive and appropriate approval workflows, accelerating approval times and improving the user experience of requisition and approval. 

• Highly Customisable Workflows: Kloo offers fully adaptable approval workflows that align with the specific nature of each expenditure with unlimited steps so you can configure the appropriate flow for a given spend. 

• AI-Generated Approver Insights:   In Sage Intacct, approvers can review and accept or reject spend from their inbox, but they are merely presented with the requested spend, disconnected from its financial context. To effectively assess the spend and make an informed decision, approvers usually need to refer to a budgeting spreadsheet or data in Sage Intacct before making a decision. Kloo provides approvers with AI-generated insights straight to their inbox so they can make efficient but informed decisions. 
  
• Conditional workflows: Conditional workflows allow AP approvals to have multiple possible routes depending on conditional factors. Kloo provides conditional workflows determined both by threshold and custom fields. Let's look at examples of these:
  
  • Threshold-based: If a spend is under £1000, the expenditure will be assigned to Workflow 1, if it is over the threshold, it will be assigned to Workflow 2. 
  Workflow 1:  Line Manager ➡️ Senior Manager ➡️ Approved
  Workflow 2: Senior Manager ➡️ Head of Department ➡️ Finance Manager ➡️ Approved

• • Custom fields: Conditional workflows can also be defined by custom fields configured by the organisation, for instance, department name or whether the spend is CapEx. This allows organisations to tailor their approval workflows to reflect the precise nature of their acquisition processes and policies.

• Conditional auto-approvals: Kloo also offers threshold-based auto-approval. For instance, after the first approver has reviewed a transaction, if the amount is over a threshold, it is automatically forwarded to the next approver. However, if it falls below this threshold, the transaction can be approved automatically, streamlining the process and eliminating unnecessary layers of approval.

Key Takeaways:

Kloo's customisable features offer a more precise and efficient approval workflow within Sage Intacct, ensuring that expenditures receive the right amount of attention – no more, no less. This tailored approach allows for faster processing of routine expenses and ensures that significant expenditures are escalated appropriately, striking the perfect balance between agility and control.