How a Plant Manager Benefits from Purchasing Approval Workflow

Before

As a plant manager, you are responsible for everything that relates to your facility, from production levels and staffing to quality control.

All the plant’s department managers report directly to you, and you report to corporate headquarters. You are a step away from the actual manufacturing process, unless there’s a problem.

When there is a situation with production that requires a purchase, you sign a carbon copy purchase order, since all indirect purchases are funnelled through your plant and not the purchasing department.

At times employees will bring you a carbon copy purchase order after they have given the PO number to a vendor to secure goods or services. This pre-committed spending happens no matter how hard you try to put procedures in place.

After all, it’s human nature to do what you need to do to get your goods and services — and clean up the paperwork after the fact.

In this role, you might be under the impression your plant is profitable during any given period — until the end of the period when you are given trial balances and are reviewing them with the plant’s controller.

This happens because you have no visibility into the data until after the period is closed, with the exception of manual spreadsheets that admin staff create to track all of those hard copy purchase orders. Not knowing where you stand at the end of the month keeps you up at night.

After

Rillion provides real time tracking of purchase orders, giving you the confidence of knowing what is in the pipeline and how to manage your supplies.

“Pre-committed spend is highlighted, so there are no surprises at the end of the month or end of the quarter.”

The purchasing approvoal workflow brings your role into the process – but only when necessary. You avoid wasting time on administration that has no impact on your areas of responsibility.

Your plant’s financial performance is visible before the period is closed.

You are empowered to make decisions to eliminate or postpone costs based on real-time data.

This series is excerpted from our Whitepaper on the Benefits of Purchase to Pay. Read more about purchase to pay automation