👉 Watch the replay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Fx40IVcrwQ
Most small businesses still run accounts payable by hand. BILL’s Will Nolasco put real numbers to it: roughly 60% rely on manual processes, and over half spend 10+ hours a week somewhere in the AP cycle. That time tax lands on firms too. The result is messy intake, choppy approvals, double entry, weak controls, and a never-ending cleanup loop before you can advise.
BILL’s pitch is simple: treat AP as a standardized, automated service that creates reliable data, stronger controls, and recurring revenue. In this session, Nolasco framed AP as a lever for three outcomes firms care about:
1) Real cash flow visibility, every day
When AP is clean and current, you can read cash in and cash out at a glance and step into planning and advisory with confidence. That’s the foundation for better conversations with owners.
2) No more after-the-fact bookkeeping
A standardized AP motion eliminates the “fix it later” grind. With clean entries and a consistent audit trail, you spend more time interpreting numbers and less time re-keying them.
3) A smoother client operation
Tighter vendor relationships, fewer bottlenecks, and less back-and-forth. Clients focus on running the business. You focus on running the process.
Nolasco contrasted the typical 14-step manual AP flow with BILL’s 4-step model:
- Capture: Each client gets a dedicated AP inbox. Invoices arrive via email forwarding, mobile capture, or drag-and-drop. BILL auto-flags duplicates or suspicious items and pulls the key fields to turn data entry into review.
- Code: Prior coding behavior trains the system. In practice, BILL is about 96% accurate on extraction, speeding up review and reducing errors.
- Approve: Role-based policies route bills by amount, department, vendor, class, project, and more. Approvers can swipe to approve or deny on mobile, with reasons required on denials and a full audit trail on every action.
- Pay + Sync: Pay by ACH on BILL’s 8-million-business network, or by check through three secured check facilities with positive pay and 90-day void. All activity syncs to the GL (QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop, Xero, NetSuite, Sage Intacct, and more), including two-way syncing of bill attachments when enabled.
For firms, the Accountant Management Console acts like a control tower: see every client, who’s using AP/AR/Spend, which GL they’re on, how they’re billed, and who on your team can do what. Standardize once, scale across clients, and keep controls consistent while staying flexible for nonprofits or other high-governance environments.
Cost matters, too. Manual processing can run $15–$18 per invoice when you count labor, rework, and risk. BILL pushes that down with automation, network ACH (often $0.59 per transfer), and fewer touches. The kicker: standardized AP becomes both stickier for clients and a clear revenue line for the firm.
Bottom line: AP is not a low-value chore anymore. With BILL, it becomes a repeatable, controlled service that strengthens client relationships and gives you the data posture to advise in real time.
📺 Watch the replay here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Fx40IVcrwQ