An inefficient procure-to-pay (P2P) process can quietly erode margins and increase costs across your organisation.
Manual steps, slow approvals, and poor visibility often lead to unnecessary spend.
Many businesses do not realise just how much is lost through inefficiencies in P2P.
Recognising the signs of cost leakage is the first step towards resolving this.
Here are seven signs that your P2P process is costing you money and time, and how UniFi helps reduce these costs.
1. Heavy Reliance on Manual Data Entry
When you rely on staff to key in data, you introduce risks of error and delay. Even small mistakes can lead to incorrect payments, missed orders, and rework.
Manual input slows down every stage of the process—from purchase requisition to invoice matching. It ties up your team in repetitive tasks instead of higher-value activities.
Using autonomous and advanced data capture technology, UniFi automates data capture and validation.
This improves accuracy, reduces time-wasting rework, shortens processing times, and frees your staff to build great relationships and close more deals.
2. Limited Visibility of Commitments and Spend
You cannot manage what you cannot see. Without real-time oversight of commitments and spend, budget owners are often reacting after the fact.
This weakens control, increases the risk of overspending, and makes it harder to manage cash flow.
UniFi P2P Enterprise Suite gives you real-time dashboards with drill-down capabilities and the ability to interface directly with supplier platforms.
This ensures that you always have real-time visibility into procurement statuses. It enables you to track orders, monitor shipments, and anticipate deliveries with exceptional accuracy.
You can track spending against budgets and monitor approvals as they happen. This supports better forecasting and tighter cost control.
3. Late or Missed Payments
Delays in paying suppliers lead to more than just late fees. They affect your ability to secure early payment discounts and can damage supplier relationships.
Missed payments introduce risk into your supply chain and reduce your organisation’s credibility.
UniFi uses automated workflows to keep invoices moving. Approvals are routed instantly, and reminders are sent when action is needed.
This helps you stay on top of due dates and maintain strong supplier partnerships.
4. Slow Purchase Approvals
Bottlenecks in the approval process can delay projects and disrupt operations. Waiting days for sign-off on purchase orders holds up procurement and forces teams to look for workarounds.
These delays can have a knock-on effect across departments.
With UniFi P2P Enterprise Suite, approval routing is automatic. The system sends notifications to the right approvers and tracks turnaround times.
You get faster approvals without needing to chase colleagues or manually escalate requests.
5. Poor Supplier Data Quality
Working with out-of-date supplier information can cause purchase errors, compliance issues, and delivery delays.
Inaccurate data increases the time spent resolving issues and reduces confidence in the process.
UniFi supports integration with web-based shopping cart platforms. Through API connections, it can pull in live product data from your preferred vendors.
This allows requisitions and purchase orders to be generated based on live supplier catalogues and ensures that you always have the correct details, prices, and terms.
It helps you maintain accurate supplier records and reduces the risk of issues downstream.
6. High Rates of Invoice Disputes
Frequent invoice discrepancies are a sign of poor matching and weak controls. Disputes slow down the payment process, add administrative overhead, and damage supplier trust.
With that, you need to spend more time resolving issues than processing new invoices.
UniFi improves three-way matching between purchase orders, goods received notes, and invoices.
Automated checks catch discrepancies early and reduce the need for manual intervention. This leads to fewer disputes and faster payment cycles.
7. Inability to Report on P2P Performance
If you cannot measure your P2P process, you cannot improve it.
Lack of clear reporting makes it difficult to identify bottlenecks, track compliance, or benchmark performance across departments.
You miss opportunities to reduce costs and increase efficiency.
UniFi provides reporting on all key P2P metrics. You can track cycle times, approval delays, and spend by category or department.
This helps you understand what is working, where problems lie, and what action to take.
Final Thoughts
Inefficiencies in P2P processes drive up costs across finance and procurement. They waste time, reduce accuracy, and increase risk.
Automating and simplifying the process helps your teams work faster and with more control.
UniFi gives finance leaders the tools they need to reduce costs, improve performance, and support better decision-making.
Speak to us about cutting hidden costs from your P2P process with UniFi or see the full demo now!