For many businesses, the pandemic caused an increase in credit card transactions due to the surge in digital payment methods. Prior to COVID-19, the world was already moving away from the use of cash to more modern payment methods. However, the lockdown accelerated this transition with one of the only payment methods being through credit card. With the rise of cashless payments, many organizations saw a surge in the amount of credit card payments they were receiving. The movement to cashless payments has increased the complexity of reconciling credit card statements.
What is Credit Card Reconciliation?
A credit card settlement reconciliation is ensuring that each settlement transaction on your credit card statement matches up with a recorded customer payment in your ERP. It is also making sure the settlement received from your depositor is correct for the credit card payments received. To maintain accurate reporting, organizations must verify each transaction listed on the statement. Most businesses reconcile their credit card transactions and deposits daily.
The Manual Credit Card Reconciliation Process
When credit card reconciliation is conducted manually, “all is well” as long as the settlements balance perfectly to the expected amount. However, if there is a mismatch, it can be very tedious and difficult to find the individual transactions that make up the discrepancy. If the discrepancies cannot be found in a timely manner, it may hold up financial closing at the end of month as well.
The number of credit card transactions on your monthly statement is likely to only increase. A McKinsey Global Payment Report projects that there will continue to be a further decline in cash usage globally and an increase in credit card and digital payment methods. With the projected rise in credit card transactions, it will be increasingly difficult for your organization to maintain a fully manual process and therefore it may be time to start evaluating automated options.
Why Credit Card Reconciliation is essential
While manually reconciling credit card statements is a tedious and mundane process, reconciling your credit card transactions is a vital procedure to maintain the financial health of your business. The credit card reconciliation procedure verifies that you are getting proper credit from your processor for the credit card payments you took in. Without a reconciliation process, your business loses the capability to accurately track that your incoming credit card payments are recorded properly.
How embedded RPA technology can transform your credit card reconciliation process:
It is becoming increasingly prevalent that manual accounting processes are not viable long-term. For companies, this will mean undergoing a digital transformation to replace outdated and inefficient procedures. Forward-thinking business leaders have seen the significant benefits that automation delivers and have jumped on the trend of replacing manual processes with Robotic Processing Automation (RPA). With the surge in credit card transactions and digital payments, it may be time for your business to consider adding an automated credit card reconciliation solution to your digital transformation plan. Reconciling your credit card statements is a monotonous process that can easily be automated through an RPA. The following are some of the ways adding embedded credit card reconciliation technology can benefit your business.
1. Embedded Technology Centralizes Data and Increases Visibility
Opting for an embedded solution, or software built within another system, is an excellent choice to unify your data and increase visibility and collaboration across departments. A popular type of built-in solution is software that is embedded within an Enterprise Resource Planning System (ERP). For example, SK Global’s credit card reconciliation module is embedded within Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance. Selecting an embedded credit card reconciliation solution will make it easy to record transactions within one centralized system fostering collaboration through easy access to valuable information and automatic synchronization of data.
The alternative would be a bolt-on solution, or a solution that works outside the main platform and doesn’t integrate seamlessly with the main system. Often bolt-on solutions have connectivity issues, complex interfaces, and have duplicate features that you receive in your main interface. Opting for a disparate bolt-on system leads to issues down the road due to lack of organization, accessibility, and a centralized database to maintain valuable metrics.
2. Robotic Processing Automation Automates the Credit Card Reconciliation Process
Practically all credit card reconciliation solutions utilize some form of RPA to automate most of or all the credit card reconciliation process. Leveraging credit card reconciliation automation frees up your accounting staff to focus on more important value-added tasks that ultimately grow your business. In a survey conducted by CIODive, 73% of US workers said they would be happier if automation replaced non-core functions. On top of managing your payroll, inventory costs, collections, and budgeting, your accountants do not need to waste valuable work hours doing manual credit card reconciliations.
3. Quickly Identify Discrepancies
Using RPA technology, credit card reconciliation solutions allow your staff to easily recognize any transactions that do not align with the recorded payment or deposit in your ERP. Automated credit card reconciliation eliminates the need for the tedious process of finding payment or deposit discrepancies. Most credit card reconciliation solutions will display the discrepancies in an organized dashboard allowing your accountants to quicky track down the transactions that do not match to the ERP.
4. Invest in more profitable expenditures
According to Forbes, intelligent automation typically results in cost savings of 40% to 75% with payback ranging from several months to several years. To determine exactly how much money adding automated credit card reconciliation will save your business your organization should conduct a cost-benefit analysis while exploring solutions. If it is indeed profitable for your business to invest in RPA to remove the manual credit card reconciliation process, your business can reallocate the funds to more profitable investments like research and development.
How SK Global Leverages Embedded RPA to Automate the Credit Card Reconciliation Process
If your business is currently using or planning to implement Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance, SK Global’s embedded credit card reconciliation module may be the right fit for you. Our credit card reconciliation solution allows you to import your credit card settlement statements into the ERP. Using RPA technology, our solution then matches the transactions in the statement to the payment record within the ERP, matches the settlement deposit, and can automate the recording of credit card fees. SK Global’s credit card reconciliation module is fully embedded within your D365 environment. It has the same look and feel as the D365 Finance interface and is certified and approved by Microsoft before every release. Our solution resolves popular pain-points in the credit card reconciliation process such as human errors, disparate data sources, and managing an increased volume in credit card payments. If you are interested in learning more about our embedded credit card reconciliation module for D365, contact us today at sales@sksoft.com to set up a demo.