Invoice processing services also help property managers monitor costs in several ways, says Brad Chandler, industry principal with Santa Barbara, Calif.-based Tech Choice Award winner Yardi Procure to Pay. Since invoices are digital, Chandler says, property managers can view them at any time without needing to search across various desks to assess property budget impact. This is key to financial decision-making throughout the month, and it also saves money, as there are no invoices to consume scarce office space. “The workflows that guide each invoice to the correct approvers eliminate the need to mail invoices to regional managers or headquarters for eventual payment,” he adds. According to Chandler, “Property managers are also able to view budgetary impacts prior to payable creation, to support future purchase decisions and also track service contract invoices against defined budgets as they are processed. “[This] provides insight of actuals against contract terms to ensure the budget continues to support the execution,” says Chandler. In addition, invoice processing can identify potential problems before they become actual problems, Chandler reports. Linking invoices to service contracts provides insight into execution actuals versus planned budgets, with each invoice eliminating reactionary steps when the budget is exhausted and the contract is not completed. Invoice processing systems can also identify duplicate invoices to prevent potential duplicate payments, which can impact cash availability. “Further, invoice workflows can be reported on when delays occur that could impact timely payment and payment discounts,” adds Chandler. “Property managers can assess the timing of payments to available cash and avoid insufficient funds and/or late fees. With electronic invoices, property managers can easily research vendor or client questions, no matter what workflow status the invoice is in.” According to Chandler, they can also expediently provide an invoice image and data, approval...

Commercial property manager Arcadia Management Group Inc. has saved money and enhanced tenant services by expanding its Yardi Voyager® property management and accounting system with products from the Yardi Commercial Suite™. Arcadia adopted Yardi Procure to Pay™, an end-to-end, paperless procure to pay system that includes purchase order and invoice processing and customized approval workflows.  The solution has produced “out of this world” results, according to Gary Shaw, president of Arcadia.  “Completing approvals and vendor payments electronically has saved time, money and the environment,” Shaw said.  “Our per-invoice cost has dropped 60% with Procure to Pay.  We process about 5,000 invoices per month, so that translates to thousands of dollars and a lot of paper.” He added, “Procure to Pay also speeds up our common area maintenance reconciliations.  With the invoices captured in Yardi Voyager, we no longer have to photocopy paper invoices and send them to vendors with the reconciliations.” To increase the level of service to its tenants, Arcadia adopted another Yardi Commercial Suite product, Yardi COMMERCIALCafé™, which gives Arcadia’s tenants a portal for submitting maintenance requests online or from a mobile device.  Allowing tenants to submit requests through the portal enables Arcadia to respond to and fulfill work orders much more quickly, driving higher productivity and increasing tenant satisfaction.  “A key advantage of COMMERCIALCafé is that our work order system is now integrated with Voyager, eliminating duplicate data entry.  Our previous work order system was separate from our property management platform, and recording actions in two databases was inefficient,” Shaw said.  Yardi COMMERCIALCafé also allows tenants to pay rent online, review accounts and update profile information. Also integrating with Yardi Voyager and providing online and mobile access is Yardi Inspection™, which Arcadia uses to set up, schedule and perform unit and...