The increased workload in the Finance department could not be handled by hiring new employees alone. That is why Orange Cyberdefense, a rapidly growing organization focused on managing and implementing integrated cybersecurity and infrastructure solutions, decided to digitize the entire purchase-to-pay process.
What prompted the decision to digitize the P2P process?
“We started in the Netherlands in 2008 with four employees. Today, we have over 70,” begins the Financial Controller at Orange Cyberdefense, who is responsible for the finance department.
Due to rapid revenue growth, the workload on the finance department was very high. Hiring additional staff no longer solved this problem, so we sought a solution that would allow us to accommodate the growth with the same number of people.
Financial Controller at Orange Cyberdefense
Why did you digitize both the procurement and invoice processing processes?
To maintain and even improve the quality of our work, we decided to fully digitize the procurement and invoice processing processes. This should ensure that, despite the expected growth in the coming years, the quality of the process is guaranteed and no additional staff are needed within the Finance department.” The Financial Controller continues: “By digitizing the entire purchasing process, we’ve essentially moved the authorization step forward. This minimizes the risk of incorrect orders and unauthorized expenditures. Bringing the authorization process forward and automatically matching purchase orders with invoices ensures that no post-facto authorization is needed and that the process runs quickly and smoothly.”
What benefits has digitizing the process brought to your organization?
“The Finance department has gained much greater control over the entire process. Digitizing the procurement process has led to greater assurance. As a result, we essentially no longer receive invoices that haven’t been pre-approved and authorized.”
There’s also a much more efficient processing workflow, which has significantly reduced the turnaround time for invoices at Orange Cyberdefense: “Authorization is now clearly documented. This means we know exactly who is responsible for which invoice and where it is located. This is very helpful when suppliers call us about the status of outstanding invoices. In addition, the digital archive ensures that everyone can easily access and retrieve their invoices. This saves us a tremendous amount of time.”
Bringing the cost authorization process to the forefront saves time and creates a more efficient workflow.
In closing, the Controller adds: “We used to receive regular inquiries at the Finance department, but since implementing 4CEE’s software, we actually rarely get any questions anymore!”