Every invoice arrives already checked.

An invoice takes five seconds to approve. Checking it properly takes longer, so on most desks it does not happen.

Checking properly means opening the bill of lading, the contract and the shipping documents side by side, and comparing them line by line with what the supplier is asking you to pay. It is slow, it is boring, and it is exactly where money leaves the company without anyone noticing.

Measured against the shipment behind it

In Apollo the check happens while you type. Every supplier invoice is measured against the shipment it belongs to and the contract behind it:

• the bill of lading number, compared without the spaces and dashes that make two identical numbers look different
• the net shipped weight on the bill of lading, against the quantity invoiced
• the unit price, against the price in the contract
• the payment terms split, against what the contract says is due now
• whether the shipment documents are complete

The invoiced quantity is prefilled from the net shipped weight, so the starting point is the shipment, not the supplier's figure.

Small gaps, real money

Three hundred kilos on a 485 tonne lot is a rounding error until you price it. Then it is a four figure amount that nobody reading the invoice on its own would ever have seen. The point of the check is not to find fraud. It is to make the ordinary gaps visible before the payment leaves.

Nothing is blocked

The check does not stop the invoice. The gap is shown, with what it costs, and the decision stays yours: accept it, or query the supplier. Some differences are expected and agreed. The difference now is that they are agreed knowingly.

Nothing is blocked. Nothing passes unseen.

For the version where an agent picks the invoice up from the mailbox and checks it before anyone opens it, see Invoices checked before you pay.

Frequently asked questions