Two thirds (66 per cent) of finance professionals in the Netherlands expect digitisation of payment processes to save an average of €5,377 per month. A significant proportion (10 per cent) even expect to save more than €10,000 per month. This is according to research by YouGov commissioned by Payhawk, the global spend management platform.
Digitisation of payment processes can save time and costs on several fronts. The biggest digitisation benefit is that freed-up time can be spent on other tasks that would previously have been pushed aside. Of the participants, 39 per cent said they would spend this time on risk analysis. But budget planning, business planning and strategy also ranked high on the preferred list at 31 per cent. All are tasks of great importance within business operations.
While the majority of finance professionals expect that digitising payments can bring down monthly costs, how big those savings are varies from person to person and company to company. Besides the aforementioned 10 per cent who expect to save more than €10,000, 15 per cent expect to save between €5,000 and €10,000 per month. Furthermore, 19 per cent expect to save between €2,500 and €5,000 per month and 23 per cent think it will be below €2,500.
Room to look ahead
Chris van Dongen, Payhawk's Benelux Commercial Director, sees that the benefits of digitising payment processes are still little exploited: "Companies of all sizes can gain substantial benefits by digitising payment processes. Not only because of the costs saved. With the time freed up, finance professionals can focus on the work that moves a company forward. Currently, the value of this is still too much underestimated and that is a shame."
Increased productivity
While the benefit of digitised payment processes is reflected in the costs that can be saved, that is the direct result of increased productivity. Almost three quarters (73 per cent) of finance professionals feel there is room within their company to improve spend management. The major benefit of a fully automated expense management system is that less time is wasted on manual processes. Besides increased productivity, this simplifies work for everyone involved.
