The partnership is a big step towards improving automated credit solutions and recommending appropriate credit limits and terms based on each customer’s unique situation. This will help businesses manage risk and ensure revenue through Esker’s user-friendly digital platform.

“CoCredo is delighted to become a strategic partner with Esker bringing together a wealth of expertise to create pioneering solutions in assisting businesses to drive profitability, avoid adverse risk, and increase efficiency that meets the evolving needs of our customers.”

Read full press release here.

Esker UK

Unlocking Positive-Sum Growth with AI-Driven Business Solutions for P2P & O2C Cycles

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Esker, a global cloud platform and leader in AI-driven process automation solutions for Finance, Procurement and Customer Service functions, today announced  that AAH Pharmaceuticals, the UK’s leading pharmaceutical wholesaler, is automating its Credit Management and Collections Management processes with Esker.

AAH Pharmaceuticals is responsible for delivering over 15 million items per week to more than 14,000 pharmacies and other organisations, operating from 14 distribution centres. Its current collections and credit management processes are manual, with data entry into several different ERP systems. A further manual process is required to check its customers’ registration with the General Pharmaceutical Council.

Esker was chosen after a highly competitive and lengthy pitch process. Success was due to its uniqueness in offering the full Invoice-to-Cash solution suite and the only company to find a solution to run automatic licence checks with regulatory councils.

Read full press release here.

Esker UK

Unlocking Positive-Sum Growth with AI-Driven Business Solutions for P2P & O2C Cycles

Read more insights from Esker UK

Offering a 360° view of supplier information, Esker’s automated platform spans the entire procure-to-pay process — equipping finance departments with AI and RPA technology and helping them effectively manage compliance, gain full process visibility and reduce staff workload.

Esker’s Credit Management Specialist, Martyn Brooke, talks about how Esker’s solutions can help organisations, particularly during the current economic climate.

A discussion between Esker’s Head of Marketing, Sam Townsend, and Esker’s Credit Management Specialist, Martyn Brooke.

This discussion is also available as a podcast. Listen here.

ST: Hi everyone, my name is Sam Townsend, and I’m Head of Marketing for Esker Northern Europe. Thanks for joining us for another Esker on Air podcast. In this session, we’ll be speaking to Esker’s recently appointed Credit Management Specialist, Martyn Brooke, and we’ll be discussing the importance of managing credit within organisations, especially in today’s economic climate.
So, at this point I’d like to welcome Martyn, and let him introduce himself. Hi Martyn. Tell us a little about yourself and about your past experience, and how you got involved with credit management, and your current role at Esker.

MB: Hello, Sam. First of all, thanks for inviting me on here, always a pleasure! So, that’s a very good question, let’s talk about how I got into this many years ago! I actually started off initially in the procurement area, for a few years, when I left school. I fancied a change, so I went into a customer service role, back in the manual days, back in the ’80s. I probably spent two or three years in a customer service role, picking up the telephone, processing orders, taking orders, issuing credit notes, etc. So, it gave me a very good grounding for, one day, when I got a call from the credit manager at a company called Altas Cop Co, and he asked me to go and work for them as his assistant. From that day on, I’ve not looked back. I’ve spent the last 35 years, roughly, working in a credit control type environment; an order-to-cash environment. So I feel that the experience that I’ve got from that, really helped me in credit management, because now, when we talk about process improvement, we’re maybe talking about digitisation, I remember the good old manual days, so I know what it’s like, and I know how cumbersome it can be.

ST: Yes it must have been good to have that experience, to be at the coal face, and understanding all of those manual processes that were involved, and understanding, I suppose, the utopia of automating that whole process.

MB: Yes, and it’s interesting that I remember my desk used to be behind a row of filing cabinets, so I could barely see the window for filing cabinets! So, offices have changed now; I’m not sure I’ve seen a filing cabinet for a while, unless it’s got stationery in it! So, those days are gone, less mistakes are made now, there’s more validation of stuff, there’s more checks, there’s more audit, and so I can understand where it’s come from over the years, and how we’ve got there. I’ve done the journey! And here I am!

ST: Excellent, so were you involved in projects that involved automation?

MB: The answer is, not so much automation; I suppose I ought to continue the journey really. I went through a few companies, so I went from Atlas Cop Co to a German distribution company, and I then went on to work for HP. In fact I worked for a company called EDS who were taken over by HP. I then worked for a company called Rockwell Automation. So they were big American companies, very disciplined companies, very process orientated companies, and I think that this is where my process knowledge has come from, and where I became a process man. That’s moved me quite well into the digital world. I do understand the process that’s behind things, and how we can improve it. I’ve done lots of SAP and ERP implementations. I’ve been involved with lots of acquisitions, so I can understand how to integrate other companies, and subsidiaries, etc. into already existing systems and departments. So, I’ve gained a lot of experience over the years with that, and I think that’s put me in good shape for the automation world if I’m honest.

ST: And that sort of depth of knowledge for your current role at Esker; tell us a little bit about that.

MB: I ran my own business for a few years, and then I stumbled across Esker. I don’t mind admitting that I didn’t know much about Esker, in fact, I probably knew nothing about Esker when I first came across them. After discussions with the senior management there, they obviously realised, and I realised, that they didn’t have anyone in the organisation that had the operational credit management and order-to-cash experience. So, I was asked to come onboard, and I came on board as a consultant, working a few hours a month, and then a couple of days a month, and then three days a week, and now most recently I’m doing five days a week. And I’m a happy man! So that’s how I’ve ended up at Esker. So, what I do at Esker. When I first joined, it took a while to define the role, but I think now, it’s beginning to take shape. I do a lot of work with marketing, not that I’m a marketeer, but I do support them in terms of webinars, events, and getting the brand out there through my contacts and my network, the Institute of Credit Management, and other shared service forums. So, there’s lot of organisations out there that maybe Esker didn’t know about, or maybe they did know about and didn’t do anything about it, but we’re beginning to get the Esker name out there now, and I’m finding that people are coming to us rather than us pushing our name in their face, more people are now coming to us, which is proving that our marketing strategy is working.

ST: I think certainly on the side of AP, they are quite savvy on that side, in terms of knowing what’s out there for solutions, and helping them with challenges that they’ve got, but I think that it’s not always the case for accounts receivable, and credit, collections, and those sort of things. So, do you think that that’s changed over the years, and that understanding is better now?

MB: Oh most definitely, yes, Let’s go back in an operational role, maybe ten years ago, when I was doing it. I wish I’d had some of these solutions pushed in my face if I’m honest. It would have made my job, not 100% easier, but certainly 50% easier. Some of the things you think about, like visibility, auditability. I spent so much of my life with audit, and trying to produce evidence. Things like onboarding new customers; all of this type of stuff. I know that I may talk about the solutions in a bit more detail in a minute, but some of the big challenges I had were bringing on new customers, credit limit reviews, and being able to evidence that properly, and having that information in front of you, and store it. I think that is one thing that automation has given people, is a consistent process, and an auditable one, I’d say. And the visibility is absolutely brilliant in automation in my opinion.

ST: That’s excellent, and yes, we’ll come on to that a little bit later. So, thanks! A great introduction, and fascinating to understand your background, years of experience and the wealth of knowledge related to the success of managing credit. So, I touched upon it a little bit at the beginning, regarding the importance of managing credit within an organisation. We’ve heard about sometimes alarming figures, from various reports, such as those from Atradious , and you hear these figures, like 53% of total value of invoices reported are overdue, 10% of invoice values are written off, and there’s also likely to be projected increase, I think they are saying over 30%, in business insolvencies worldwide in 2022. So I guess, from your point of view, what are some of the actions an organisation can do through automating the credit management process to try and combat some of these challenges that organisations are faced with?

MB: So, before I go into the automation bit, I was actually lucky enough to listen to a few people yesterday, and I’d completely forgotten, over the last four or five years, some of the things that we’ve been through. We’ve been through some challenges and got through those challenges, and I’m sure we’ll continue to keep going through those challenges. Brexit was probably the first one. We weren’t sure of the impact of that, and we’re still not 100% sure what the impact is! And then we had the covid period come along; we had to deal with covid, and that was unprecedented. I don’t think anyone can take that away in terms of what knock on effects that has had on recruitment, retention of staff, ‘The Great Retirement’, where a lot of people who were at the end of their careers, and didn’t want to come back into it. We’ve had guys who should have already gone through university, haven’t gone through university, so they’ve now probably deferred that, and they’ve now decided to go into university, so we have a labour shortage. We have inflation that’s soaring, although, I saw yesterday that they reckon it’s come down slightly to about 9.9%. We’ve got supply chain issues, we have energy issues, we’ve got fuel prices. I sat in that room yesterday and I’d forgotten all of these things are challenges that are going to affect everyone. That’s it bluntly.

ST: Yes, it’s a perfect storm.

MB: Yes, they are the words I was probably looking for. So let’s just remind ourselves that we’ve got these challenges. Fraud is probably another one, and there are a lot of fraudulent claims, or have been a lot of fraudulent claims with the covid stuff. CBILS and that type of stuff. So again, it’s just going to be another challenge. And HMRC have got their own challenges of trying to retain and attract staff to actually collect this money, and the Treasury putting pressure on them.

ST: And it’s compliance and credit policies I guess; things like that?

MB: It’s all the way through, Sam, and I can’t sit here and list everything; I can’t remember everything! But there’s just a few things that I wanted to mention. Obviously, there’s the invasion of Ukraine, and that pushed prices of fuel and grain and things like this up. You talked about insolvencies there, and there will be an increase in insolvencies, because you think that the knock on effect of all this is going to be that, with the supply chain issues, with inflation, cost of materials going up, there are companies out there who can’t finish projects, they can’t then bill for projects, they can’t get their money in, and they also then can’t pay the staff, and you are going to get companies that are going into all sorts of voluntary arrangements, credit and voluntary arrangements, and insolvency. It’s going to be a real challenge. So, coming back to your question on automation, let me start by saying, visibility, as I said earlier on, is one of the things, across whatever you are doing, whether onboarding a customer, ongoing credit analysis of your customer, collecting money from that customer, applying the cash correctly from that customer; to me, everything has to have visibility to be able to make those quick decisions, and if you haven’t got that visibility, you don’t know where you are at any given time. So, to me, that’s one massive benefit! People often think it’s a cost benefit straight away, but no, it’s actually, for me, it’s doing more with less. So it’s not about how many FTEs can I cut, it’s not about that, it’s about, we’re a growing company, we want to grow, but obviously, we want to grow in the correct way, and obviously, we don’t want to keep have to onboarding people. I can understand that, because there’s a cost to that, there’s training, there’s everything else. So doing more with less, to me, with automation, I think is a huge benefit.

ST: So almost, visibility is, with the customer management side of it, the visibility sits in the middle and, like you were saying, it’s performance monitoring, and credit application; all those kinds of things, monitoring risk, you’ve got to have visibility over all of those different areas.

MB: Yes, you have, and then of course there’s going to be a fight to collect your money. As money dries up, which inevitably it will with high interest rates and insolvencies, and I don’t want to depress people, but it is something that we’ve got to face. I guess the speed that you can collect your money; that goes back to visibility. What is outstanding out there, it goes back to good onboarding, because you’ve got to get your customer master data correct, you are trading with companies that can afford to pay you. I could sit here all day and talk about the benefits of automation! The other thing is employee morale, because you are given good tools to work with, and nice products to work with, and therefore they are happier people!

ST: Yes, I was going to come on to that. Obviously, we always focus on the benefits within an organisation, and that’s excellent, that’s what we want to do. We turn the phrase positive-sum growth. It’s a phrase that means a win-win for not just internal wins, but also external, so customers and suppliers. So, it’s kind of sharing the value of those benefits. Have you seen that and how that works through automation?

MB: Well, again, self-serve isn’t it? I call it self-serve. And I’m not saying that it’s the more you can get your customers to do, it’s not about that either, I don’t want the customer to think, “I want a copy of the invoice, so I’ll just ring up ABC Ltd.”, it’s not about that, it’s about enabling your customers to get their invoices straight away, they can get copies, they can dispute in a portal, they can pay in a portal. So it’s that self-service, it goes far beyond saying, there’s your invoice; pay. It’s about communication, because the systems talk to each other. Just relying on email, to me, and sending an email out there, and hope you get a response at some point, we need to leave those days behind. I think it’s now using the most up-to-date technology, and I think that Esker’s solutions can help. That’s Collections, and we’ve got other good things like a good Claims and Deductions module, which at the moment is doing an absolutely fantastic job in the FMCG, it works really well for those types of suppliers.

ST: Tell us a little bit about that, Martyn.

MB: Well, I used to deal with it. Let’s be honest, you had big supermarkets, pub chains, DIY people; they used to do a lot of promotions.

ST: Is this things like end of shelf promotions and those sort of things that we see in the supermarket?

MB: Yes, and there would be, for example, a few cans of baked beans that were bent, or crooked, and the supermarket would deduct that from the supplier. Never mind that they might have dropped it at their end, they would issue either a debit note or a claim, and they send this nice long remittance back, and then you’ve got to handle that, so the poor supplier sees a remittance with possibly a thousand invoices on it, but then they see maybe 120 deductions at the other end that they’ve then got to manage, which is a shortage of money; they weren’t expecting it. So our Claims and Deductions tool is something that really is fantastic, because it links with the Cash Application module, it will then create that claim within the Claims and Deductions module, and it’s got an inbuilt workflow, an escalation path that you can pre-define based on the deduction, so we are saving customers so much time, in terms of spreadsheets. And again, I’ll go back to the employee morale bit, people don’t want to be sitting there just entering numbers into spreadsheets, and distributing spreadsheets all over the organisation.

ST: I’ve heard that term, because we’ve talked about ‘burn out’, but now this is ‘bore out’, or being bored, have you heard that term? So, people are suffering from ‘bore out’ now, instead of ‘burn out’. And that’s true, they are doing these monotonous manual tasks, and it’s taking their time away really from the real benefit to the organisation, and that’s dealing with customers and suppliers, and making sure that process is seamless and efficient.

MB: Yes, with respect, you’re going to lose good people if all they are doing is boring, repetitive tasks all day, so automation takes that away and allows them to do, as you say, more strategic tasks, and more process improvement. So, yes, I’m trying to keep the benefits of automation to, not really at a functionality level. I’m trying to keep it at a high benefit level. Hopefully that makes some sense anyway.

ST: Yes, absolutely, and I think, in terms of what you are saying, it does span the credit management side of it, it’s helping to facilitate the customer onboarding, credit approval process, and we talked about improving collaboration, visibilities. That’s that key thing that you mentioned that sort of encompasses everything. And just getting better control over that management as well, and lowering the risks.

MB: Absolutely!

ST: Reducing those write offs! And allowances for bad debts and keeping that down.

MB: I was speaking to a company the other day, and I just could not believe what a lot of manual processes they’ve got. This is a big organisation by the way, and I was speaking to the order-to-cash person, and she could not believe how much some of our tools could help her. She basically used the word, that she fell in love with a few of our solutions, and that is really nice to hear somebody say that, because this is why we have developed them, and this is why we believe they will be successful. But I think that people automatically think that automation is just a bottom line thing. It’s not just a bottom line thing, and there is so much more to it, which we’ve mentioned today, so I just want to make that doubly clear really.

ST: Yes, it’s good to hear those things, and myself as well on the marketing side, we hear that from our customers, and working with the customer experience department and it’s great to hear that feedback! We heard from a customer just the other week, and, you don’t like to blow your own trumpet, but when you hear these sort of things, it’s nice to get that feedback, and actually, her team had bought some flowers and put them on her desk, thanking her for having a solution that would automate that process, so it’s incredible to hear that!

MB: There you go, you see! A happy customer and a happy workforce! How about that?

ST: Well, thanks for your time, Martyn. That’s been fascinating, and sort of a short delve into it, and there’s lots more that we could go into but I really appreciate your time today. Thanks for joining us!

MB: You’re welcome, Sam, a pleasure to be here. Thank you.

This discussion is also available as a podcast. Listen here.

This podcast and previous episodes in the series can also be found on Spotify.

Esker UK

Unlocking Positive-Sum Growth with AI-Driven Business Solutions for P2P & O2C Cycles

Read more insights from Esker UK

We are over half of the way thorough 2022. It’s nearly a year since I wrote my last blog which looked at new features in O2C. 2022 seems to be going faster than ever, and I feel that the world is getting back to some sort of normality. My diary has certainly been filled with web meetings but I have ventured out on the M40 motorway on a couple of occasions. I enjoy meeting people for real and taking a break from the web cam. It’s a shame however, that the traffic has returned to its terrible pre-Covid levels.

Cashing in with new automation features

2022 has been a busy, interesting, and sometimes challenging year. We continue to go-live with a number of projects but I have certainly found that the popularity of our cash solutions has increased across Credit Management, cash Collection Management and Cash Application processes. My last blog talked about the number of ‘under the hood’ features that I have found with our Order Management solution. The same is true for our ‘cash solutions’ which are now fully integrated, giving our customers an end-to-end O2C solution. The list below is certainly not exhaustive, but I have seen some key changes and improvements in the following areas;

Credit Management – Enhanced workflow rules and mobile approval capabilities for customer onboarding.
Collections Management – Salesforce integration, improved views of historical (and future) ageing information and a projected view of future collection activities.
Cash Application – Enhanced discount handling, seamless SAP connectivity and enhanced templates for more efficient customer communication.

The above features are certainly creating a buzz and I’m excited to see further changes. Customers can check out the ‘What’s New’ section in our product documentation.

On a personal note, I am delighted to be starting a new position within Esker. From the 1^st July 2022, I have taken up the position of Sales Manager and have responsibilities for our expanding UK team and a handful of key customers. I look forward to a new challenge after over 15-years of direct sales.

If you’d like to learn more about using Esker’s solutions to improve your O2C processes with automation, please contact me and my team – we’d love to help.

Paul Stevens

Paul is the Sales Manager for Esker UK. He has been part of the Esker family since 2006.

Read more insights from Paul Stevens

Here’s a quick rundown of how Esker can automate the areas of AR that matter most to your business;

Manage your customer credit risk
Esker’s automated Credit Management solution optimises the entire credit approval and risk monitoring process, empowering credit teams with actionable data to make the best credit decisions possible. By transforming credit management into a more secure and efficient process, revenue is secured and customers are prevented from slipping through the cracks.

Deliver invoices efficiently
Our Invoice Delivery software solution was designed to automate the delivery and archiving of customer invoices via any media (e.g, paper, e-invoices, EDI, etc.) — all without forcing your customers to change or sacrifice compliance and all while providing real-time visibility into invoice delivery status.

Collect cash intelligently
Thanks to automated collections, all your AR-related documents can be automatically generated and sent according to your rules and/or your customer preferences. Meanwhile, tasks requiring action are automatically assigned to the right person at the right time — it’s that easy!
What’s more, enhanced collections capabilities ensure that your customers’ payment habits are permanently analysed to provide predictions on invoice most likely pay dates, priority customers to contact, accurate AR collections forecasts and more.

Quickly process claims and deductions
Esker’s Claims & Deductions automation solution helps businesses efficiently manage their claims and protect margins. Thanks to Al-driven data capture and electronic workflow capabilities, Esker manages both customer claims associated with products (product shortage, damaged products etc.) and customer financial deductions (e.g. trade and promotional invoices etc.)

Simplify payment
To get paid quickly, today’s businesses need online payment capabilities at different steps of the order-to-cash process — pre-order, deposit, at the due date or during the collection process. Thanks to Esker’s advanced online payment capabilities, your customers will have no reason not to pay and can even benefit from early payment discounts by paying before the due date.

Accelerate cash application
Managing multiple payment sources and formats (e.g. banks, lock boxes, emails, PDFs), not to mention the different levels of data in each document, can be a real pain for AR teams trying to allocate cash in a timely and effective manner. Esker’s AI engine automates the manually intensive process of matching payments received from all incoming payment information sources so your team can focus on higher value tasks and control cash flow in real time.

To find out more about how Esker’s automation solutions can optimise your AR processes download our new eBook here.

Here at Esker we know a ‘one size fits all’ approach to process automation doesn’t work, so whether you’re focused on a specific area of AR, or looking for a seamlessly integrated end-to-end automation solution contact us today, we’d love to hear from you!

Claire Barker

As Marketing Specialist for Esker UK, Claire is responsible for generating leads for Esker's business process solutions specifically within the area of Accounts Receivable through a variety of marketing channels. She has been part of the Esker family since 2019.

Read more insights from Claire Barker

Plain Sailing – Business Objectives
The objective of any business is to sell its products or services and then get paid for them as quickly as possible. Usually, it goes like this: You make a sale, send an invoice and — hopefully — you get paid!

Rough Seas – The Reality
Sometimes, though, this flow is interrupted by missing information or process gaps that slow down the reception, recording and availability of the payment amounts. To increase the chances of getting paid in full and on time, an effective onboarding process will assess any potential risks, and help teams to define appropriate credit terms as the basis for a much easier path ahead.

Think of it this way… would you lend your lawnmower to the neighbour you know is not going to return it for months? Deciding which customers to extend trade credit to is kind of the same thing: you need to know who you’re dealing with. Esker’s Credit Management solution retrieves data directly from your preferred credit bureau and displays this information on the customer profile or credit application for review by the decision-makers.

Still Waters – Ideal Processes with Automation
Goods and services are delivered to the customer faster when you have the correct contact, billing and shipping information. A digital credit application creates fully customisable credit templates and sends them via email or embedded link (included in sales quotes or communications) to get the most complete and accurate information from the customer ahead of the first order. This speeds up customer creation in the ERP and ensures data accuracy right from the outset.
When coupled with an automated receivables (AR) solution, an AR automation platform offers a 360-degree view of critical customer information, empowering teams with actionable data to make the best credit decisions possible.

Crucially, real-time internal customer account data (such as, open invoices, total outstanding, pending orders, payments, receivables history and aging graphs) can be viewed and assessed as part of the customer credit review process.

With an ever-growing scope of data to keep on top of, teams can be assured that no major credit event will go unnoticed and put revenue at risk, as today’s automation solutions are packaged with fully customisable dashboards, counters, and alerts to keep credit managers fully aware of ongoing credit activity and potential risks including credit alerts, credit reviews and blocked orders.

And managing approvals can be a doddle, as automated workflows are assigned to all necessary stakeholders to review and approve data to which they are responsible for, ensuring a fully traceable and cohesive approval process.
With everything going so smoothly, there will be a lot of new customers to onboard. Letting an automated credit application do the brunt work takes the pressure off of the AR staff.

Smooth Sailing – Building business resilience with positive-sum growth

As current pressures on supply chains, interest rates and inflation show no signs of abating, the future is about building a complete digital infrastructure that can support efficient, customisable digital journeys for onboarding that can gather and maintain information as smoothly as possible. Business resilience is key, and Esker’s Credit Management solution provides your business with the necessary information for reducing risky credit and securing revenue, while treating your customers with integrity and fairness. That’s what we call positive-sum growth – which is just a fancy way of saying that when your company succeeds, it never happens at the expense of any team, individual or enterprise in your business ecosystem — everyone wins!

If you want to know more about Esker’s Credit Management solution, don’t hesitate to get in touch. We’d love to hear from you.

Claire Barker

As Marketing Specialist for Esker UK, Claire is responsible for generating leads for Esker's business process solutions specifically within the area of Accounts Receivable through a variety of marketing channels. She has been part of the Esker family since 2019.

Read more insights from Claire Barker

According to a recent report by Euler Hermes, corporate insolvencies are on the rise globally and expected to increase 20 per cent to $3.5 billion in 2020, largely resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. Today more than ever, organisations must thoroughly evaluate their credit risk and clearly understand to whom they’re selling on credit.

From the digitalisation of credit applications and approval processes to monitoring of the existing customer portfolios, Esker provides credit managers with the required information to lower credit risks and secure their revenue.

Read full press release here.

Esker UK

Unlocking Positive-Sum Growth with AI-Driven Business Solutions for P2P & O2C Cycles

Read more insights from Esker UK

In an age of constant change the core objectives of credit management have remained unchanged for decades; maintain healthy cash flow, minimise bad debt and reduce exposure to risk.

However, in the eternal race to find better, faster and cheaper ways of working, businesses must constantly improve how they deliver these objectives. The arrival of ERP systems several years ago fuelled and supported the growth of financial systems to deliver such improvements, and it’s the case today with AI to take this to the next level.

There is much debate surrounding AI and it’s a subject that can certainly divide opinion. While some view development with excitement and optimism, others deem it a threat; a dangerous endeavour that will take over the world.

The fact is that we are witnessing a profound transformation that is affecting markets, companies, our world and our own personal lives. Technologists predict that AI will bring about the greatest step-change to the global economy since the last Industrial Revolution. Yet AI, machine learning and robotic automation are already affecting the way we live and do business, and to a far greater extent than we may realise. So, perhaps the future heralds an evolution, rather than an AI revolution?

A brief history of artificial intelligence
The phrase ‘Artificial Intelligence’ was first coined in the 1950’s by John McCarthy, when he held the first academic conference on the subject. But interest in AI and robotics began well before then. Examples of independent-thinking artificial beings have been staples of pop culture for decades — from Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818) to Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) and James Cameron’s The Terminator (1984).

In the 1960’s and 70’s there were steady improvements to AI capabilities. Computers became cheaper, more accessible and had greater computational power (computer storage and processing speed). There were high hopes for AI; it’s commonly cited that in 1970 Marvin Minsky told Life magazine that ‘In from three to eight years we will have a machine with the general intelligence of an average human being’.

This proved optimistic as, nearly half a decade later, human level machine intelligence is still to be realised. But since then machine-learning algorithms have significantly advanced, as the memory and speed of modern computers can retain and process vast amounts of data.

Varying degrees of intelligence
So, whilst the question of whether a computer can truly think remains unknown, a computer’s ability to process logic is undeniable. One technology with roots in the application of programmable logic is RPA.

RPA drives innovation within financial processes by automating repetitive, manually-intensive tasks and workflows. It is particularly effective in automating data entry and processing of invoices, due to its ability to quickly recognise and extract data within structured documents.

Since its introduction in the early 2000’s the RPA market has developed rapidly as businesses explore new ways to apply the technology to processes and workflows in a bid to optimise business performance. By 2022 Gartner research estimates that 85% of large companies will have deployed some form of RPA, and spending is on pace to reach $2.4bn.

RPA isn’t a new concept though, at its core is a pre-defined set of algorithms to allow the automation of high-volume, structured tasks with the goal of increasing efficiency. Exceptions can be managed by ‘teaching’ the software new ways of handling specific circumstances, but it has no in-built intelligence, relying on human input to tell it what action to take.

AI that utilises deep learning is a more complex technology than RPA, but also more powerful in terms of understanding process complexities and discovering the optimal solution required.

Deep learning is learning based on a multi-layered neural network as opposed to task-specific algorithms. For example, with deep learning you can train computers to build algorithms that know how to deal with complex issues or make decisions with an expected outcome in a given situation. It’s AI that makes it possible to develop autonomous cars, automatically detect medical anomalies, or even win a game of chess against a human champion.

Solutions being developed within the area of credit management such as Esker, a worldwide leader in AI-driven process automation and pioneer in cloud computing, will see increasingly improved processes within an organisation. For example, using data available on a specific company (such as that sourced from credit bureaux) and then analysing this in relation to the behaviour of how a specific company has paid its invoices previously (over a set time frame and possibly using other departmental data within the company such as orders or claims) can prove to be very beneficial. Basically, this would allow the most appropriate credit limit to be proposed and recalculated automatically in the future through a deeper learning of the information.

Deep learning also allows Esker’s platform to sort messages received from multiple channels based on the nature of the document (e.g. invoice, order form, spam, etc.) or the language used. Plus, it can open a document to check if it contains one or more invoices and send them to the correct approval workflow – all such non-value-added tasks previously undertaken by finance professionals.
AI and deep learning today are located on the perimeter between research and applications, however their diffusion into the real world will be rapid and profoundly change the nature of back office functions.

Technology’s impact on financial operations
AI automation can transform credit management, increasing the speed and accuracy in which routine tasks can be undertaken allowing real-time visibility with customisable dashboards and built-in KPIs. By freeing up people from low value and repetitive tasks, RPA and AI can lead to increased employee empowerment to focus on strategic accounts to improve customer relationships or generate high-level reporting for more precise decision making. Furthering professional development can also be gained through the opportunity to access a broader skill set.

Credit management therefore gradually shifts from an operational, task-oriented function to one of analysis, management and fraud control. Technology allows financial operations to not only measure performance in real time, but also identify problems or opportunities as they arise and thus become a key player and partner in a company’s strategic development.

Bringing together human and artificial intelligence
Even with the many benefits that RPA and AI can bring, technology does not replace the need for people, because it cannot replicate what are truly human skills. It cannot think creatively or imagine solutions by itself, it cannot apply social or emotional intelligence to a situation.

So, whilst AI and its role in the workplace continues to evolve, the alarm bells are fading as a more balanced view emerges. The robots are coming, but they will bring neither an apocalypse nor a utopia. At Esker we believe intelligent automation is the combination of AI and human intellect – the melding of the best the two have to offer.

About Esker
Esker is a worldwide leader in cloud-based document process automation software, helping financial and customer service departments digitally transform their order-to-cash (O2C) and purchase-to-pay (P2P) cycles. Used by more than 6,000 companies worldwide, Esker’s solutions incorporate technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) to drive increased productivity, enhanced visibility, reduced fraud risk, and improved collaboration with customers, suppliers and internally. Esker operates in North America, Latin America, Europe and Asia Pacific with global headquarters in Lyon, France, and U.S. headquarters in Madison, Wisconsin. For more information on Esker and its solutions, visit https://www.esker.co.uk. Follow Esker on LinkedIn at Esker – Northern Europe, or on Twitter at @EskerNEurope and join the conversation on the Esker blog.

Read full press release here.

Alistair Nicholas

Alistair is the Managing Director of Esker Northern Europe

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