16 hours and 53 minutes. That’s more than 2 full working days (for those of us who aren’t workaholics at least). And that’s how much time the average SMB employee spends on financial processes according to Basware’s SMB Finance research. Oh, those financial processes aren’t part of these employees’ job responsibilities. Hmm. The most time-consuming exercises include responding to supplier/customer enquiries, creating and sending invoices and reviewing invoices to be paid.
No wonder
This coincides with the findings that in Europe, almost half of SMB business owners (46%) don’t believe their company has a clear procedure for approving invoices to be paid, compared to 38% in the US. Similarly, 52% of US employees and 50% of European employees do not believe there is a clear process for chasing unpaid invoices, leaving the SMB vulnerable to cash flow challenges. Add to this that 64% of European SMBs manually invoice customers (compared to 40% in US), while 77% manually approve/pay purchase invoices and those two days don’t seem so out of proportion.
Inefficient financial processes and manual systems
John Webster, Vice President of Global Product Marketing, Basware comments: “Although SMB resources are often being stretched to the limit in this challenging economic climate, employees in these organizations are still spending a significant amount of time on tasks that may be completely unrelated to their role. The SMB Finance findings suggest this resource drain is down to inefficient financial processes and manual systems that are preventing small businesses from transacting successfully with suppliers and buyers, issues that need to be addressed if growth and health cash flow is to be achieved. By automating their financial processes, SMBs reduce pressure on employee time, remove manual errors and establish a platform for growth which stems from effective finance.”
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