Top 10 advances in procurement automation

Traditional manual processes may be favoured by many across procurement, but with huge advances in automation in recent years, many businesses are missing out, choosing long-established methods over unfamiliar ones.

IT company Quandary Consulting Group has compiled a list of the biggest benefits of procurement automation…

Vendor relationships can grow

For businesses to thrive, teamwork within the company and outside of it is essential. 

Procurement automation can support this: 

• Invoice automation ensures vendors are paid on time
• Businesses can compare vendors to find the best one for their business
• Streamlined communication can improve operational efficiency, helping vendors

Heightened organisation

Paper documents consume time and space, add to disorganisation and stationary costs. Essential items can be misplaced, lost, stolen and destroyed. 

Procurement automation digitises this information, making such data organised and accessible.

Centralised communication

Procurement automation systems allow communication to be more efficient:

• Vendors can use a self-service portal to approach procurement businesses
• Employees can request purchases directly on the platform 
• Management can approve purchase orders instantly or ask for further information

Data insights

Inaccurate or incomplete data on customers and their purchases compiled manually by workers can lead to huge problems, but procurement automation provides data insights that are accurate.

Simple data dashboarding

Gathering uptodate data manually means that by the time it is presented, it is out of date. 

Procurement automation streamlines reports. With integrated systems, your purchasing data will flow into a single portal that’s easily accessible and understandable.

Smarter shopping

There are many reasons as to why online shopping is so popular. Using automation allows those in procurement to spot discounts and mistakes. 

Enhanced work experience

Despite being well established methods, many people find manual tasks to be deeply boring. In addition, this eats into valuable work time.

With procurement automation, employees can skip dull processes and use automation to deliver the best results. 

Transparency

With the international supply chain being so vast, it can be difficult to get a full picture of what is going on and how one disturbance may impact something higher up the chain. However, it is the customers who lose out and who demand better service. 

Through automating the procurement process, transparency is immediate, objective and detailed. 

Cost savings

Controlling spending across all businesses is still essential and procurement automation helps reduce expenses drastically.

Although some might argue that automation sucks up jobs from workers, it actually allows employees to work on their real jobs, instead of spending time on time-intensive tasks. This enhances productivity and sales can soar.

Adapt to unpredicted events

The events over the past two years, from the pandemic to environmental catastrophe, have taught the procurement industry a firm lesson in being resilient. 

Procurement automation provides information to keep businesses agile such as:

• Timeframes
• Data
• Resources

The insight here helps businesses stay aware of potential risks and allows them to take swift action, instead of making decisions after a disruptive event has occurred.

Expect the unexpected and build resilience across manual and automated processes.