What is invoice validation?

Invoice validation is the process of reviewing and verifying invoices to ensure that they are accurate, legitimate, and compliant with the agreed contract before they are approved for payment. This process is essential for maintaining financial accuracy, preventing errors or fraudulent activities, and ensuring that a company only pays for utilities services that have been properly received and agreed upon.

What steps are involved in validating an invoice?

Here’s an overview of the steps typically involved in invoice validation: Receipt and Review The first step is to receive the invoice from the vendor or supplier. The invoice is then thoroughly reviewed to ensure that it contains all the necessary information, including item descriptions, quantities (generally consumption), prices, and any applicable taxes or discounts. Matching with Contracts and Pricing Verification The invoice is matched against the corresponding contracts, or agreements to verify that the utility services have been invoiced as per the contract and the consumption volume or quantity is correct. Any discrepancies are investigated and resolved. Compliance Check The invoice is checked for compliance with regulatory requirements, tax laws, and company policies. Any discrepancies or non-compliance issues are addressed before approval. Duplicate Check: Invoices are screened to prevent duplicate payments. This involves comparing the current invoice to previous payments to ensure that the same invoice hasn’t been processed before. Payment Approval Once the invoice has successfully passed all validation checks and approvals, it is marked as valid and approved for payment. This is then sent across the the organisation's Finance Department in a batch for payment. This can either be weekly batches or monthly depending on their requirements.

How do we ensure an invoice is valid?

To ensure an invoice is valid, we compare the invoice to a number of sources of information. We build the invoice up from first principles to compare it against that billed by a supplier. The sources we compare invoices to can include, but are not limited to: Energy supply contracts Trading Logs – particularly for flexible supply contracts Charging Statements, e.g. NorthernPowerGrid Consumption data recordsRateable values (Water)

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MAINTAIN ACCURATE UTILITY INVOICING WITH OUR INVOICE VALIDATION PROCESS

With up to 20 different charges on a utility invoice, in our experience, one in four invoices contain some sort of error. Our market leading invoice validation team meticulously analyse your utility invoices to identify billing errors and anomalies, and take corrective action with the supplier through to resolution.

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OUR 6 STAGE APPROACH TO UTILITY INVOICING

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What is invoice validation?

Invoice validation is the process of reviewing and verifying invoices to ensure that they are accurate, legitimate, and compliant with the agreed contract before they are approved for payment. This process is essential for maintaining financial accuracy, preventing errors or fraudulent activities, and ensuring that a company only pays for utilities services that have been properly received and agreed upon.
What steps are involved in validating an invoice?

Here’s an overview of the steps typically involved in invoice validation:

Receipt and Review
The first step is to receive the invoice from the vendor or supplier. The invoice is then thoroughly reviewed to ensure that it contains all the necessary information, including item descriptions, quantities (generally consumption), prices, and any applicable taxes or discounts.

Matching with Contracts and Pricing Verification
The invoice is matched against the corresponding contracts, or agreements to verify that the utility services have been invoiced as per the contract and the consumption volume or quantity is correct. Any discrepancies are investigated and resolved.

Compliance Check
The invoice is checked for compliance with regulatory requirements, tax laws, and company policies. Any discrepancies or non-compliance issues are addressed before approval.
Duplicate Check: Invoices are screened to prevent duplicate payments. This involves comparing the current invoice to previous payments to ensure that the same invoice hasn’t been processed before.

Payment Approval
Once the invoice has successfully passed all validation checks and approvals, it is marked as valid and approved for payment. This is then sent across the the organisation's Finance Department in a batch for payment. This can either be weekly batches or monthly depending on their requirements.
How do we ensure an invoice is valid?

To ensure an invoice is valid, we compare the invoice to a number of sources of information. We build the invoice up from first principles to compare it against that billed by a supplier.
The sources we compare invoices to can include, but are not limited to:

Energy supply contracts
Trading Logs – particularly for flexible supply contracts
Charging Statements, e.g. NorthernPowerGrid
Consumption data recordsRateable values (Water)

UTILITY INVOICE VALIDATION

WHY IS A UTILITY BUREAU IMPORTANT?

A utility bureau is important for helping businesses save on utility costs through accurate bill validation and are only charged at their contracted rates. Acting as intermediaries, utility bureaus negotiate favourable terms, resolve disputes, provide comprehensive data management, energy and water use tracking, sustainability reporting and resource optimisation.

UTILITY CONTRACT MANAGEMENT

CAN UTILITY BUREAU BENEFIT BUSINESSES?

A Utility Bureau is a valuable partner for businesses looking to control utility costs, manage supplier relationships, and optimise resource usage. By ensuring accurate billing and supporting sustainability initiatives, Bureau Analysts offer expertise and services that simplify utility management, saving time, resources, and costs. With the guidance of a Utility Bureau, businesses can make informed, data-driven decisions to reduce expenses and achieve long-term efficiency.

UTILITY INVOICING

WHAT CHALLENGES DO BUSINESSES Face with Utility Invoicing?

Utility invoicing presents significant challenges, particularly with ensuring invoice accuracy and validating bills. Businesses often encounter errors such as incorrect tariffs, duplicate charges, or miscalculated usage, which can result in overpayments or budgeting issues. These errors are difficult to spot due to the complexity of energy contracts, fluctuating tariffs, and varied billing formats.

Outsourcing to a utility bureau provides a practical solution. With expertise and advanced bill validation software, bureaus efficiently identify discrepancies, recover overcharges, and ensure compliance with contract terms. This reduces administrative burden, enhances cost control, and frees businesses to focus on core operations.

ENERGY BILL VALIDATION

CAN A UTILITY BUREAU IMPACT REPORTING?

Energy reporting and billing accuracy can be impacted by a Utility Bureau, through centralising data collection and implementing robust validation processes. Ensuring data is accurate, up-to-date and accessible developing a transparent and reliable reporting system. Accurate billing prevents overcharges, reduces errors, supports financial planning and improves consistency.

UNLOCK THE DOOR TO UNDISCOVERED SAVINGS AND PROPEL YOUR BUSINESS FORWARD WITH ENERGY BILL VALIDATION

Our team of experts leverages advanced technologies and unwavering attention to detail, unveiling hidden billing errors and discrepancies that could be draining your profits. Outsource the management of your utility invoice validation to the experts.

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