Driving Fact-Based Accounts Payable Automation
About this Project
- Client: Global leader in specialty insurance distribution and niche risk solutions
- Industry: Insurance & Specialty Services
- Focus Area: Automation Roadmap Across Accounts Payable (AP)
The Challenge
Our Client, a global specialty insurance firm, faced a significant challenge in its Accounts Payable process. The company operated with multiple AP company codes and a high volume of manual activities across territories, all running on SAP.
Leadership knew inefficiencies existed—but they lacked the objective data to pinpoint which specific, rule-based tasks were ripe for automation, and where the potential impact was greatest. They faced critical questions:
- Which repetitive tasks were most suitable for automation across territories?
- What was the quantifiable potential for efficiency gains, cost savings, and error reduction?
- How could they build a clear, prioritised automation roadmap across different business units?
Without system-based evidence, automation risked becoming another costly, assumption-driven initiative.
Why FUTUROOT?
The client needed more than high-level assumptions — they required data-driven clarity to identify automation opportunities and quantify impact.
FUTUROOT delivered by:
- Revealing Automation Hotspots — Identified repetitive, rule-based AP tasks across company codes and territories that were ripe for automation.
- Quantifying Resource Savings — Measured manual effort and error-prone steps to prioritize initiatives with the highest ROI.
- Exposing Process Bottlenecks — Highlighted delays and handoffs in AP workflows that slowed invoice processing and increased risk.
- Providing a Fact-Based Business Case — Quantified potential improvements in cycle times, error reduction, and cost savings to guide investment decisions.
This approach transformed the initiative from a speculative, assumption-driven effort into a clear, evidence-backed automation strategy, giving leadership confidence that resources would be invested where the greatest impact could be achieved.
Our Approach: Anchored in Data, Not Assumptions
Using FUTUROOT’s advanced automation readiness toolkit, our client gained a transparent, multi-level view of their AP landscape:
Variant Explorer
Cross-Code & Territory Analysis – Analysed process variations across company codes and geographies. This revealed how identical tasks (e.g., invoice processing) were executed differently and pinpointed where repetitive, rule-based tasks were most prevalent. Leadership could filter and compare data by territory or unit, ensuring automation opportunities were scalable, not siloed.
Workforce Analytics
Manual Effort Hotspots – Mapped where human time and effort were consumed most heavily. This provided a clear picture of the “automation sweet spots”—the steps where automation would free up the most resources and reduce error-prone manual work.
FR Analytics & Business Case Calculators
Quantified ROI – Established measurable success metrics (processing times, error rates, cycle efficiency). Quantified both current inefficiencies and future improvement potential, giving leadership a robust, fact-based business case to guide investment.
Bottleneck Analysis
Cycle Acceleration – Visualised where delays occurred in the AP workflow, exposing handoffs and process steps that created cycle-time drag. These became prime targets for automation to accelerate end-to-end processing.
Business Outcomes Delivered
FUTUROOT transformed what could have been a prolonged, high-risk guesswork exercise into a rapid, evidence-backed strategic decision:
Automation-Ready Invoices
Process mining revealed 42% of AP postings were ready for automation, doubling straight-through processing from 35% to 70%.
Hours of
Reduced Manual Workload
Automation of repetitive invoice checks eliminated low-value tasks, freeing teams to focus on strategic activities.
Error and Exception Reduction
AP error rates dropped by 45%, eliminating thousands of correction tickets and reducing rework.
Faster Invoice Cycles
Processing time was cut from 12 days to 6 days, accelerating end-to-end AP workflows.
Cost Savings from Automation
Automation delivered $1.5M in annual savings by reducing manual workload and improving process efficiency.
“FUTUROOT gave us the transparency we needed to make confident decisions about our automation roadmap. Instead of opinions, we had the facts in front of us—fast.”
Leadership Team Feedback