Partner with Rockford Associates for your accounts payable reviews

June 18, 2024

Image: © jacoblund | iStock

Find out here the 12 reasons to partner with Rockford Associates for your Accounts Payable Reviews, to eliminate the need to look over your shoulder constantly

The AP knowledge bank
- Rockford Associates knows where to look! Over the last 22 years, we have created our own comprehensive database of suppliers that represent the best starting point for an AP Audit. Some of your suppliers are very familiar and serial offenders, withholding your cash, placing sums in suspense accounts, forgetting to remind you of the prepayment made four years earlier or worse, simply writing off monies owed to you. This knowledge enables us to expedite the AP Audit process, ensuring it is “light touch” and analytic by nature. Better still, you can be confident your business will not suffer the same disappointment experienced by other clients.
The buyer-supplier relationship
- You rightly expect your key suppliers to be honest and transparent in all their business dealings. You may have invested heavily in supplier relationship teams dedicated to the management of high-spend suppliers. Is there really anything more disappointing than to find your key supplier has knowingly withheld monies owed to you when you felt the working relationship was fine? The trust you have developed with your suppliers over so many years can be eroded in one or two material transactions; however, you will still be pleased you know and or have recovered what is rightly owed to you.
The pioneer of Multiyear AP Audits & Real Assurance
- Rockford Associates have pioneered Multiyear AP Audits. Over 45 established clients and partners enjoy the multiple benefits our ongoing five-year assurance plans provide, including:
  - Quicker recovery of funds.
  - Reduced expenditure – Eliminating spend on duplicate/statement matching software.
  - Systematic errors identified quicker/ implications minimised.
  - Contingency-based agreement.
  - Guaranteed fixed contingency fees.
  - Ongoing independent validation & positive reassurance.
Findings and Recommendations Report
- On completion of every audit, Rockford Associates provides each client with a Findings and Recommendations Report. This report details every error identified and, just as importantly, why the client made the error and how best to rectify it in the future. In essence, an effective accounts payable recovery process combines technology, skilled personnel, and rigorous processes to identify and recoup lost funds. However, it’s just as important to use the insights gained from these audits to refine and improve your AP processes on an ongoing basis.
Pathfinder software
- Rockford’s proprietary Accounts Payable Analysis software Pathfinder creates 50 audit reports, each identifying overpayments using multiple criteria and algorithms, and quite simply finds errors and duplicates where other options can’t. In addition to identifying errors in accounts payable data such as:
  - Goods or services are being paid for twice.
  - Payments are being made to the wrong supplier.
  - Payments are being made using the wrong currency.
  - The by-passing of existing software duplicate checks.
  - The same invoice is being paid across different systems, countries, divisions or ledgers.
  - Credit notes are being paid as invoices.
  - Underclaimed and overclaimed VAT.
Track record
- Rockford’s full-time auditors have in excess of 100 years of experience, delivering forensic audits for a wide range of business sectors, both private and public. Since 2001, on behalf of private and public sector clients, Rockford Associates have:
  - Completed over 750 reviews.
  - Analysed £ billions of private and public sector spending.
  - 100% success rate.
  - Recovered £100 million in overpayments.
Real social value
- Rockford Associates believes it is their responsibility and duty to meet the expectations of employees, clients, the community and the environment. As part of their commitment to the Crown Commercial Service – Debt Resolution Services Framework RM6226. Rockford Associates will donate a percentage of all fees directly to the community organisations and charities identified by our clients all over the UK.
CCS Framework
- Since 2018, Rockford Associates has completed accounts payable audits for the Public Sector as part of the Crown Commercial Service Framework. This Framework ensures that public sector organisations across the UK can access the most effective forensic analysis services to recover historical overcharges or overpayments from their supply chain. Recoveries can be achieved quickly and simply via Direct Award through the Framework with minimal internal resources.
Statement Review
- Rockford provides a quarterly Statement Review to ensure prompt identification and resolution of any issues or discrepancies, providing greater accuracy in payments and reports.
Always risk free
- Rockford Associates operates on a no-recovery-no-fee basis at no cost or risk to our clients for 20 years.
Guaranteed non-disruptive
- All audits are delivered remotely, ensuring that they are completed without disruption to clients and suppliers alike and reducing Rockford’s carbon footprint and impact on the environment.
Independent Validation
- Rockford Associates is independent, objective and impartial, which, in addition to providing greater credibility to the audit results, can also bring a fresh perspective and identify areas for improvement that may well have gone unnoticed by the internal AP team.
- Whether it’s identifying and recovering funds for our clients or delivering on our social value promises to local communities across the UK, Rockford Associates is committed to quality, innovation, and delivering real value. To find out more and how you would benefit from a risk-free review delivered by Rockford Associates, please see our contact details below.