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2021 Action Items: Stop Accounting Double Entry

Continuing our conversation on how distributors can reduce friction in their daily operations, today we’re going to look at the numbers, and by that we mean Accounting. We promise this won’t be a lecture on Accounting 101. Instead, this conversation will review this facet of your business and the significant role it plays in the success of your company.

Over the past 25 years, we’ve come across many distributors who transition from a standalone accounting solution or a combination of systems to an all-in-one ERP solution. It may not sound like a major change at first, but consolidating accounting into a single system that also relates to all of your other essential distribution departments can have a major impact on your organization. Let’s take a look at how this happens more specifically.

When it comes to sales orders, the more disparate systems you have, the more times those orders need to be entered. In the event that you use an accounting system and a separate inventory management software, every order you receive and manually enter causes double the amount of work for your team. Imagine a sales rep receiving an order with 10 lines worth of product. That order is entered, the product is picked, packed, and shipped, and now has to be relayed to accounting. The completed order is typically printed or emailed to the accounting department just to be keyed in again, line by line, for invoicing. This equates to unnecessary work for your accounting team and repeats what has already been done once. With separate systems, 50 orders a day also means 50 orders the accounting team has to enter. ERP software, on the other hand, eliminates the double entry, saving time and allowing your team to move on to other tasks.

Ideally, the accounting team can simply view available orders to be invoiced and select one without having to enter it again line by line as an order first. To save even more time within the invoicing process, users can perform automatic order billing. This function can group orders together that are ready to be invoiced and process them all at once. So, if there are 30 orders ready to be invoiced, automatic order billing can save what typically could take hours of your day and finish it in just minutes.

A real-world example of these benefits is made abundantly clear by our customer Empire Bolt & Screw. Based out of Spokane, Washington Empire Bolt & Screw has specialized in fasteners and industrial goods since the early ’70s. Our relationship with them started in 2009, and they immediately began reaping the benefits of a complete ERP system with integrated accounting. According to Empire Bolt, their accounting processes were able to be reduced to just 2 hours of work a week, which previously took up the equivalent effort of a full-time position! For more on the success of Empire Bolt, click here to access their case study.

If you’ve been considering a change from multiple accounting and inventory tools to a single ERP system, the benefits are clear. Innovative ERP-ONE+ software enables distributors to improve operational efficiency, eliminate redundant tasks, improve the accuracy of data, and much more. A simple rule to keep in mind is: “More systems equal more complexity and work.”

Top-performing modern distributors discover ways to streamline their processes by finding small time savings that, over the course of a week, month, or year, can truly make a difference in your bottom line. Are you ready to see how your team can start saving time? Contact our team today, and we’ll help you get started on the path to a better business.