Working With SMEs to Reduce Invoice Fraud

Criminals are adopting increasingly-sophisticated strategies to trick accounts payable teams into processing fraudulent invoices.

Scammers are getting better at spoofing emails and mimicking the identities of trusted suppliers to create invoices and communications that appear to be completely authentic.

But while the criminals’ methods evolve, so are the tools that are being developed to better protect our businesses from the threat of invoice fraud.

Webexpenses Invoice Processing is a cloud-based solution that streamlines and automates supplier invoice management to give finance teams more effective ways to monitor and control payments.

Webexpenses has been working closely with SMEs to refine the process and to create a fast, simple and fully-integrated workflow. By removing the need for information to be manually input or transferred, it empowers financial controllers.

Outdated invoice processes raise risks, here's how to fix them

It’s the inefficiency of the traditional manual approach that has made accounts payable teams so susceptible to these new sophisticated forms of invoice fraud.

The more invoices that are being handled, the greater the risks become with only cursory checks likely to be made as vital signs of fraudulent activity remain undetected.

With Webexpenses Invoice Processing, any invoice that’s received is automatically scanned. OCR technology identifies the relevant information and converts into a digital format.

Automated checks verify the legitimacy of all the invoice information, from purchase order numbers to the known details of trusted suppliers. If discrepancies are found, invoices are flagged for further investigation.

Full integration with a range of accounting software provides a fast and fluid way to share this invoice data across finance platforms. Through reducing the administrative burden, accounts payable teams have the time and tools they need to carry out thorough checks.

The rising problem of invoice fraud and the benefits of an integrated approach are explored in more depth in the latest edition of XU Magazine, a publication for Xero users.

Follow the link to read the full article "How Technology is Helping to Fight Invoice Fraud".