You work for a company that owns, uses, and manages hundreds (if not thousands) of IT and telecom assets. With each of those assets a cost comes bundled neatly together to create a bill that you must pay for.

Do you think you and your organization are currently paying all those bills in the best way possible?

The old way of paying telecom bills

Let’s take a step back. When was the last time you had to get something done that involved a team of people? Maybe it had nothing to do with bill-paying but instead was a project that had deliverables from each person.

If you weren’t the team lead on the project, for a moment, imagine you were. Imagine for that project you had to get some deliverable from person A. Then, of course, you will have to review it. Then send it back to update. Wait on the revision. Repeat with person B. Person C. Etc. Sound familiar?

At its simplest, this process is how bills are typically paid in organizations. Each month, stacks of telecom bills are dropped on an Accounts Payable desk and that person oversees running through that manual process x 1000. Manually verifying charges, manually finding the dollars and sometimes cents that don’t add up, and then manually tracking down the who, what, where and why.

That long-winded process for a project is annoying… but doable.

In comparison, using that process for your telecom services, which Gartner labels one of the most crucial components of the increasing 3.7 trillion worldwide IT spend, is a different story. Relying on manual processes will cost you real dollars.

Updating your process to work in today’s fast paced world

Updating your current telecom bill paying processes to start saving you money rather than costing you money lies in harnessing the power of the AP File.

AP files are typically used in the telecom expense management world to feed into your Accounts Payable system for payment, chargebacks and/or allocation.

AP Files are the one aspect of a TEM customized from the ground up to your organization’s requirements. This is to help you be better able to string costs back to their cost center. But also, it is to help create a focus on what matters to your specific situation.

The customized file demonstrates all data associated with costs, cost centers, GL codes and anything related to your financial needs. It is tailored to the Finance department to get visibility into cost allocation and create the possibility of accurate chargeback.

The direct benefit to your team by automating the bill paying process through the AP file can be significant time and money.

Let’s dig into how.

The AP File – Ensure accuracy. Improve with automation.

A major key behind the AP file is understanding while every organization categorizes costs in different ways, every organization can benefit from the same thing: visibility.

While one company might separate costs associated by service to a department, another might lump them all together and not even know where that cost is coming from. Regardless of the how, the end goal for every company revolves around finding a way to associate costs to their cost center.

The AP File is the answer to group all the costs, to break them down in whatever way is important to you. This way, your finance team is freed from the shackles of manual work in excel, which can typically take most of their weeks work each month—especially when you have thousands of invoices and multiple providers.

Finally, yes, using the AP File can make it easier to visualize that data that matters to you. But, at its root, it can make it possible to uncover the WHY in your bills. For instance, why are we being charged this amount? Where is the charge? Who is responsible for the cost?

These questions have always been important to your business. Using an AP File gives you the opportunity to answer those easily.

Ready to use your AP File to reduce telecom costs?

The AP File is the best way to allocate your costs to get more visibility, easier processing and drive automation into your bill paying processes.

Harnessing the power of the AP File is a result of Upland Cimpl as your one single source of truth. Alongside an AP File customized to your organization’s needs, Cimpl will help you take back control of your telecom environment. With our unique Managed Services we help you identify and reduce unnecessary IT and telecom expenses and save time on invoice processing by automating workflows.

Interested in learning more about how the AP file can help your team cut down on telecom costs? Try out our new Telecom Savings Calculator. This completely free calculator will give you a starting sense of how much you can save on your telecom expenses.