Featured: Charline LeMarchand on the Advantages of Electronic Invoicing
septiembre, 22 by Cono Fusco | Announcements, Events, Webinars
Don’t wait until 2024-2026 to take advantage of the benefits of electronic invoicing!
Charline LeMarchand, Business Development Manager for Therefore, speaks to archimag.com about electronic invoicing.
The full article in French is available here. An unofficial translation of the interview with Charline is available below.
Although electronic invoicing will not be mandatory until 2024 for large companies, 2025 for SMEs and 2026 for VSEs, it is better to anticipate and digitize accounting flows now. The advantages are numerous: increased efficiency, more direct exchanges, better document traceability, optimized collection time, reduction of hidden costs related to paper invoices (printing, enveloping, postage, etc.). Charline Le Marchand, business development manager at Therefore, a specialist in information management and business processes, tells us more.
What should you pay attention to in an accounting flow digitization project?
Charline Le Marchand: You shouldn’t focus on a small part of the process, such as the automatic extraction of invoice data. The time saving is mainly in the validation process and automated reminders. Focusing only on the invoice can also lead to blockages later on if the solution is not adapted to manage the supporting documents, because it is the processing of the entire chain that will really bring benefits and structure to the organization.
What advice could you give to companies that want to go digital but are still hesitating?
C. L. M.: Start small but look at the big picture. Concentrate on a specific project: for example, processing supplier invoices, keeping in mind the digitization of all related flows, not just accounting. The solution must be scalable, able to manage accounting, purchasing, but also other strategic documents of your structure on which there can be a significant gain in time, security, compliance, collaboration or financial gain: HR, production, technical documentation, legal, etc.
How does Therefore support organizations that are starting to use electronic invoicing?
C. L. M.: We offer software that allows organizations to digitize the processing of supplier or customer invoices: automatic end-to-end processing, extraction of invoice data, validation workflow, affixing of certificates, export of accounting data, archiving to guarantee the integrity of the documents and sending or making available on a portal, etc. We are not going to limit ourselves to processing the invoice alone, but rather take into account the entire purchasing process. We will be able to manage all the documents related to the invoice: receipts, purchase orders, delivery notes, requests for quotations or purchase orders, etc. This generates significant time savings and efficiency, and peace of mind in the event of an audit or tax control. We will not only archive these documents, but also provide other automation solutions, such as online quote request forms or purchase requests.
How do you differ from other solutions on the market?
C. L. M.: Our Therefore solution is very powerful but also very easy to configure, so most of our customers are autonomous to develop their use. We accompany them on a first project and often they tell us about the implementation of other needs brought up by the users. The ease of implementation of our workflow and the ergonomics of our web access are also very much appreciated but I think that our eform module is the most differentiating, it offers countless possibilities, totally integrated, and as a bonus it costs nothing more and is unlimited!
Do you have any concrete projects to share with us?
C. L. M.: We have in particular the Roederer Group, a general insurance broker, which uses Therefore to manage the archiving and the processing of all the document flows of its Personal Insurance branch. Roederer deployed the automation of supplier invoice processing in 2 weeks during the first containment. There is also the company Brangeon, equipped with Therefore since 2015 for the management of its customer and supplier invoices and other corporate documents. The electronic customer invoice has thus allowed to save over 800 thousand Euros over 1 year, simply in stamps and enveloping and, at least, 1 week of collection time. As for the supplier invoice, the implementation of Therefore allowed the financial department to gain in efficiency on the treatment in all the service, and to have no impact on the operations at the time of the confinements. Our customer specifies that «users would not go back for anything in the world»!
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