5 Reasons Dealers & Trailer Manufacturers Need to Automate their Accounts Receivable Process

Written by Allegiance Merchant Services

Trailer manufacturers saw a decline in total output by 34% due to lower demand, COVID-19 safety challenges, and supply chain disruption. As the economy recovers and freight demand increases, there is now a backlog on trailer orders into 2022.

If the events of 2020 inflicted mayhem on your cash flow — specifically your accounts receivables — you’re not alone.

As a dealer or manufacturer, how do you ensure you have enough cash in the bank to survive? How long does it take for businesses to pay you after they place a trailer order? How many hours does your accounting department waste following up on late payments? How much in receivables do you write off at the end of the year? These are all questions you should be asking yourself.

Don’t wait for the next economic crisis: automate your accounts receivable (A/R) process today, so your cash flow can survive future upsets. Here’s why.

1. Because it streamlines your employees’ work

Biller Genie’s features save office teams time by automating repetitive tasks. This tool automates many of your A/R and reconciliation processes. It easily saves your team 10 to 20 hours of administrative work per week.

A global study recently revealed that workers waste an average of three hours a day on automatable tasks, a labor cost that adds up quickly. Biller Genie helps your people automate a number of time-consuming tasks, like...

• Sending new business clients a “payment information” PDF to fill out and return
• Fielding neutral or even unpleasant questions
• Sending outgoing emails or calls to remind clients of unpaid invoices
• Briefing customers who need to remember historical transactions

Instead of these tasks, your employees can spend time on more positive, personal, relationship-building conversations with your customers. Transferring time and energy away from automatable tasks also mitigates mistakes.

2. Because it improves your customers’ accounts payable (A/P) experience

Your employees aren’t the only ones who want to avoid extra conversations. Biller Genie lets customers skip the redundant discussions and simplify their relationship with you. How?

By giving them the nudge to remember to pay you on time. For companies not using Biller Genie, 59% of overdue receivables need three or more follow-ups to resolve the outstanding payment. “Most customers don't actively avoid paying you,” said Tom Aronica, Founder & CEO of Biller Genie. “They sometimes just forget, and it's just not in their thought process.” Once an invoice is overdue, customers may see your name and number on caller ID and feel a pang of guilt, or worse, aversion.

Billie Genie sends automated (yet personalized and friendly) messages to replace those icky interactions. Plus, the tool provides customer web portals that are available 24/7, so your clients don’t need to wait until business hours to manage their accounts.

3. Because it makes it easy for your customers to manage their accounts

When you use Biller Genie, your customers get a user-friendly dashboard that shows them all the information they need regarding their account with you:

• They can opt to pay now instead of waiting until they’re auto-billed.
• They can input and securely store other payment methods.
• They can update their profile with new personal information
• They can view all of their historical payments and transaction history to make important decisions, like when to pay their late fee or credit card processing fees.

4. Because it allows you to scale easily

Biller Genie irons out workflows and communication channels that otherwise get snarled when businesses grow. When businesses scale up, one of the most common casualties is processes in the A/R department. Companies that adopt new technological solutions willy-nilly suffer tangled, insecure redundancies that threaten workflows and morale.

You can also adjust the tone and voice of each customer’s reminders. When businesses grow, their messaging traditionally becomes less human and more corporate. Often, growing companies can’t accommodate the varied histories and needs of each customer, so they stick with safe yet flavorless phrasing. Biller Genie solves for this, allowing a specially customized “tone of voice” for every situation, all without taking up all your team’s time.

5. Because it’s a cinch to adopt and use

Don’t settle for tools that add stress, friction, or new bottlenecks to your A/R processes. With Biller Genie, there’s no need to change your current invoice generation process.

A recent survey revealed that three-quarters of small business owners struggle to implement new technology. Biller Genie can be set up in minutes with just a few clicks, and there is no new software to learn, just set it and forget it. Once connected, the software completely takes over.

The time for automation is here - don’t get left behind.

At Allegiance Merchant Services, we are always looking for innovative, game-changing tools to provide our merchants. The age of automation has arrived. Dealers and manufacturers that choose to implement a solution, like Biller Genie, typically see a reduction of overdue invoices by 40%, get paid 15 days faster, and save 10-20 hours of weekly administrative work. Don’t get left behind, automate your A/R and ensure you get paid on time, every time.

To learn more, please call 800-450-9125 or visit NATDAPAY.com.