Many companies have difficulty with their customers when the company bills for the quantity that it believes it shipped to the customer, but the customer argues that it received a different quantity and only pays for the amount it believes it has received. This problem results in the invoicing staff having to issue credits after the fact in order to reconcile the amount of cash received from customers to the amounts billed to them. The amount of work required in these cases to match the amounts billed to the amounts paid is usually greatly in excess of the dollar amounts involved and has a profound impact on the efficiency of the billing staff.
New technology makes it possible for some companies to completely bypass this problem. If a company has its own delivery staff, it can equip them with portable computers and printers and have them issue invoices at the point of receipt, using the quantities counted by the customer as the appropriate amount to invoice. To begin, the shipping staff determines the amount to be shipped to a customer and enters this amount into the main accounting database. The amount in a specific truckload is downloaded into the portable computer of the delivery person, who then brings the truckload of goods to the customer. The customer counts the amount received. The delivery person calls up the amount of the delivery on the portable computer’s screen, enters the quantities that the customer agrees has been delivered, and prints out an invoice for the customer (which may be on a diskette or CD if the customer prefers an electronic copy). The delivery person then returns to the company and uploads all invoicing information from the portable computer to the main accounting database, which records the invoices and notes any variances between the amounts shipped and the amounts received by customers (which will be investigated if the variances are significant). It is also possible to upload information at the customer site, either by dialing up the accounting database through a local phone connection or with cellular phone access. This process is capable of eliminating problems caused by customer disputes over delivered quantities, resulting in less work for the accounting staff.
Though a technologically elegant solution, this best practice is only applies to a small number of companies meeting some very specific criteria. First, a company must make deliveries with its own staff; a third-party delivery service will not perform the on-site invoicing function. Next, this solution requires a good knowledge of computer systems to implement. There must be not only a qualified and knowledgeable in-house computer systems department, but also one with the budget to create such a system. Also, this is an expensive solution to implement (if only because every driver must be furnished with a computer and printer), so there must be a clear trade-off between the implementation and capital cost of the system and benefits from reduced accounting staff labor. These criteria tend to point toward only larger companies making frequent deliveries to a large number of customers.