Managing the Cash Cycle: Accounts Payable Best Practices
Overview:
Introduction:
This 5-day program will provide a leading-edge forum for you to significantly improve your working capital management skills. You will gain a comprehensive range of very practical and highly effective tools and approaches that can be immediately implemented upon your return to work.
Course Objectives:
At the end of this course the participants will be able to:
- Work effectively with the fundamentals of accounts payable.
- Understand and apply the fundamentals of effective transactional management systems
- Review and comment on payment methods and cash management
- Understand the need to incorporate risk and uncertainty into transactional processing and cash flow management
- Identify best practice across all industries by examining case studies from across the globe
Targeted Audience:
- Finance Executives
- Accountants
- Others who are working within Transactional Finance, Accounts Payable or Accounts Receivable process or who wish to develop a practical toolkit to complement their existing professional or technical skills
Course Outlines:
Unit 1: Accounts Payable, Financial Accounting, and the Supply Chain:
- Accounting and financial information: Accounts Payable in context
- Sources of finance
- The supply chain
- Financial position and financial performance
- Cash flow and Working Capital
- Why is cash flow so important?
Unit 2: Achieving World Class in Accounts Payable Processes:
- Defining Best Practice in AP
- Moving beyond P2P
- Managing Risk
- Principles of Best Practice
- End to End AP Process
- Defining the issues in Accounts Payable
Unit 3: Improving Invoice Processing and Operational Management:
- Invoice Handling and Approval Processes
- Verifying invoice data
- Paying “low value” items
- How to avoid duplicate payments
- Making the best use of staff time: limiting telephone calls to AP
- Does Petty cash management belong in Accounts Payable?
Unit 4: Harnessing Technology in Accounts Payable Processes:
- Master Vendor File Management – getting it right from the start
- Travel & Entertainment
- Policy management
- Cash advances and employee reimbursement
- Process improvement through imaging and workflow
- Using the internet for AP effectiveness
Unit 5: Making the Payments and Maintaining the Relationships
- Communications & Customer Relations
- Payments status information for vendors and internal customers
- Improving Procure to Pay(P2P)Cycle
- Payments and Payment Solutions: Accounts Payable or Treasury?