Invoice Entry Methods Pros and Cons

Celia Green
Celia Green
Fourth Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Facilitator 1
in Blackbaud Financial Edge NXT® General Discussions

We've been entering invoices using Expense Managment. But there are some things we don't like so we are thinking about using the other method- going to “Payables” then “invoices”. Has anyone else used both methods of invoice entry? What are the pros and cons of both?

Comments

  • Aubrey Rigby
    Aubrey Rigby
    Third Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Participant

    I have not used the Expense Management, because the Invoices module has always worked well for us. However, I am interested in exploring the Fast! Invoice system, and thought you might be too. There is some info on it here:

  • Kim Szalkus
    Kim Szalkus
    Seventh Anniversary Kudos 2 Name Dropper Facilitator 1

    Hi Celia - We use Expense Management almost exclusively for Payables entry because of the approval routing capabilities. Yes - there are definitely some bugs with it that can be annoying, but we like the routing functionality enough to suffer through the bugs. I have posted several of them in Idea Bank - so hopefully BB will make the fixes soon.

  • Sharon Pisarcik
    Sharon Pisarcik
    Third Anniversary Facilitator 1

    We are new to FENXT and have bene using the route of entering invoices through payables but there appears to be no way to approve the invoices entered as the a/p staff entering can change to approved. I have chatted with support and they said there is no way to prevent that. Also, there is no way to require approval on the entry of a new vendor. I am looking to make sure controls are in place and surprised that there this system is not more flexible to allow. Anyone have any suggestions, besides introducing some compensating controls?

  • Celia Green
    Celia Green
    Fourth Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Facilitator 1

    You can have approvals on invoices if you enter them through Expense Managment. (Click on Expenses then Manage Expenses). The part that we have a problem with is that you can only select one approval rule. We have some invoices that need to go to multiple approvers. We now pick one person's approval route and then send the invoice through DocuSign to get it signed off by everyone else. It's a pain and we don't like it but it does the job.

    As for vendors, you could set them up as inactive and then once they are approved, have that person change them to active. That's really the only way you can do that as the vendors don't have approvals built in. You also have to be very careful as you can't search by SSN/EIN when looking for duplicates.

    The system works but not well.

  • Sharon Pisarcik
    Sharon Pisarcik
    Third Anniversary Facilitator 1

    Celia,

    Quick question-how did you set up the expense management for use by your a/p staff in terms of setting up distributions? For example, we have many programs and they all purchase copy paper so it is not like we could link the vendor to one program. We need to be able to select, for example, out office supplies vendor and be able to select the program that the particular invoice applies to.

    thanks for your input

  • Celia Green
    Celia Green
    Fourth Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Facilitator 1

    Each department has their own “pot” of money, so to speak. Each pot can be used to buy the same things from the same vendors but the account string tells us which pot it's coming out of. Does that help?

  • Sylvia Cook
    Sylvia Cook
    Sixth Anniversary Kudos 5 Name Dropper Participant

    In expense management setting, select the expense category and use select the first distribution method and enter the account code. Each user needs to be set up with their distribution default which would have their department code.

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  • Sharon Pisarcik
    Sharon Pisarcik
    Third Anniversary Facilitator 1

    I understand what everyone is saying as the user drives the cost center but what about when the user is the accounts payable clerk? We were told that we should use Expense Management to enter invoices by A/P rather than going under Payables to enter invoices as you don't have a way to require approval.

  • Sylvia Cook
    Sylvia Cook
    Sixth Anniversary Kudos 5 Name Dropper Participant

    Ah, I see what you are getting at. I am pretty sure once you finish the line with the expense category and amount that the distribution opens up underneath and then you can adjust the account number accordingly.

  • Karen Edwards
    Karen Edwards
    Eighth Anniversary Kudos 1 Name Dropper Participant

    We use the web purchasing portal to do our approval routing, which includes the fiscal staff that do all the coding. I've been considering using expense management in a limited way, but I'm not sure how changing the coding works yet, so we haven't done it. The staff that I would want to have enter his invoices is our fleet mechanic, but even he works on vehicles tracked in 3 cost centers, so a default cost center would not be accurate most of the time.

  • Sharon Pisarcik
    Sharon Pisarcik
    Third Anniversary Facilitator 1

    Karen,

    So what does your a/p clerk do when she receives an invoice that was not driven by a PO? Where is she entering?

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