After rapid growth of the business through a series of mergers and acquisitions, a Just-in-Time manufacturing division of a large multi-national conglomerate was left with a decentralized accounts payable (AP) process across nearly 200 plants worldwide. The company had two outsourced shared services environments, inconsistent processes, and limited visibility into when invoices were received and paid.

To process more than 2.5 million invoices each year, the company wanted to centralize and standardize invoice processing across the division and bring its outsourced shared services center in-house to increase controls and transparency.

The initial phase of the solution was implemented in less than 4 months and has since been expanded to other divisions of business, which were each running separate ERP systems. Today, the company is processing more than 10,000 invoices per day, faster, and at a lower cost per invoice. By moving the outsourced shared services in house, the company can now process invoices with an accuracy of greater >70% OCR recognition rate across all European languages. The company estimates that they have saved over $7 million in processing fees each year through faster invoice processing, captured discounts, and reduced late payment penalties.

The initiative received the company's Chairman's Award which is the highest company-wide recognition.