Automation can take a lot of routine work off your plate, particularly in finance and admin. Bank feeds, recurring invoices, payment reminders and receipt capture can all run largely on their own once they are set up properly.
The aim is not to remove people from the process. It is to stop skilled people spending their time typing in numbers, chasing paperwork and doing the same task every week.
Where to start
The best candidates for automation are tasks that are frequent, repetitive and follow clear rules. If you can write down the steps on one page and they rarely change, a system can probably do it.
Spend a week noting where your time goes. Common answers are entering bills, matching bank transactions, raising invoices, chasing payments and collecting timesheets. These are usually the quickest wins.
Bookkeeping
Cloud accounting software can pull in transactions directly from your bank each day. Rules can then suggest or apply the right account for regular payments such as rent, software subscriptions and utilities. That turns bank reconciliation from a monthly chore into a short daily or weekly review.
Receipt and bill capture tools let you photograph a receipt or forward a supplier invoice by email. The tool reads the date, supplier, amount and VAT and creates a draft entry with the image attached. That also keeps you on the right side of record-keeping requirements, including Making Tax Digital.
Invoicing and getting paid
If you bill the same customers the same amount each month, set up repeating invoices so they go out on time without anyone remembering to do it.
Automatic reminders can follow up overdue invoices at set intervals. They are polite, consistent and do not get forgotten when you are busy. Adding a payment link to invoices so customers can pay by card or direct debit removes another reason for delay.
Payroll and team admin
Payroll software can calculate pay, tax, National Insurance and pension contributions, send the Full Payment Submission to HMRC and email payslips. Linking it to your accounting software means the journals post themselves.
Holiday requests, timesheets and expense claims can also move into apps, so you are approving items on screen rather than chasing paper forms. From April 2027 most benefits will have to be payrolled, which is another reason to make sure your payroll system is set up properly now.
What still needs a person
Automation is only as good as its set-up. A bank rule that codes a transaction to the wrong account will do it every time, quietly, until someone notices. Someone needs to own the system and check the output.
- Review regularly. Look over coded transactions and the aged debtor and creditor reports at least monthly.
- Watch the exceptions. Unusual payments, new suppliers and one-off items need human judgement.
- Keep control of payments. Automating bill entry is sensible. Approving and releasing payments should still involve a person, both for accuracy and to reduce fraud risk.
- Do not automate a bad process. If a task is muddled, fix the steps first.
Counting the cost
Most of these tools are charged as monthly subscriptions. Individually they look small, but they add up. Before adding another app, check whether your existing accounting or payroll software already does the job, and whether the time saved is worth more than the fee. Review your subscriptions once a year and cancel anything you no longer use.
What to do
- List the repetitive tasks that take up most of your team's time each week.
- Check what your current software can already do before buying anything new.
- Start with bank feeds, bank rules and receipt capture, then move on to invoicing and payroll.
- Give one person responsibility for reviewing the automated output each month.
If you would like help setting up your systems so they do more of the work, book a free call.
