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Phi-Lean.ai – True Lean software automation

Building materials distributor

Every supplier invoice matched to the order and the delivery, approved in one click

Forty supplier invoices a day, to be matched by hand against the order and the delivery note. Discrepancies slip through for lack of time. Phi-Core does the matching and only shows people what deserves their attention.

Target

1 click

to approve a matching invoice

The scenario

A 35-person distributor with three depots and 200 suppliers.

The flow, end to end

This use case, laid out on the Phi-Core architecture.

  1. What triggers it

    • Inbox & messagingInvoice received at the accounts-payable address

  2. The agents at work

    Phi-Core
    • Document ReadingReads invoices, orders, PDFs and photos, and extracts the useful data.
    • WatchCompares with previous weeks and flags drifts, with their likely explanation.

  3. You validate

    The accountant approves matching invoices in one click; discrepancies go to the buyer, with the explanation.

  4. What comes out

    • Systems kept up to dateInvoice pre-entered in accounting, linked to its order
    • Tasks & approvalsOne-click approval of matching invoices
    • Smart alertsPrice, quantity or discount discrepancy flagged to the buyer
    • Briefs & synthesesWeekly summary of discrepancies by supplier

Today

  • Invoices arrive as PDFs, sometimes twice.
  • Matching against the order and the delivery note is done on screen, line by line.
  • Price or discount discrepancies slip through for lack of time.
  • Late payments cost early-payment discounts, sometimes the relationship.

With Phi-Core

  1. The invoice arrives as a PDF at the dedicated address.
  2. The reading agent extracts the supplier, number, lines, prices, discounts and due date, and spots duplicates.
  3. Phi-Core finds the matching order and goods receipt, and compares quantities and prices.
  4. If everything matches, the invoice is pre-entered and put to the accountant for one-click approval.
  5. If there is a discrepancy, the buyer gets the detail (“12 bags invoiced, 10 received”) and decides.
  6. Every Monday, the watch agent summarises discrepancies by supplier.

What we look at first

Before plugging anything in, we spend time with the people who do this work. That is where most of the value lies: a well-understood flow automates simply; a poorly understood one automates badly, whatever the tool.

  • Where the order and the goods receipt live, and in what form (ERP, scanned paper note).
  • The accepted tolerances: rounding, carriage, small differences.
  • The suppliers where discrepancies concentrate.

What changes

  • Manual matching disappears for matching invoices.
  • Discrepancies are seen, and recovered.
  • Payments go out on time, early-payment discounts included.
  • A clear view of which suppliers invoice badly.

Plugged into your tools

The accounts mailbox, the ERP or sales management software, accounting software that accepts automated exchanges.

Safeguards

  • No invoice is paid without human approval.
  • Tolerance thresholds are set by you, and visible.
The Lean principle behind this caseThe result: Profitable today and tomorrowMaking money, now and in the futureRead on phi-lean.com

Does your flow look like this one?

Describe it in a few lines: we will tell you where we would start, and what we would look at first.

Talk about my flow

Typical scenario, built to illustrate Phi-Core; it is not a client reference. The targets shown are design goals: yours are set during the diagnostic, from your real flow.

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