Almanac · 07 · Money · essay
Single payable
Rob Balawender · Editor
A midsize shipper does not have just a freight problem. Disputes die in email; tolerances become SOP.
A midsize shipper does not have just a freight problem. It has an accounts-payable design that wears a freight hat. Ten carriers, ten portals, ten “where is my money” calls, ten people who know a different version of the rules.
Common payables look like this: invoices land in email and portals; disputes die in threads; tolerances get written into SOP so someone can settle and move on. Audit and payment are not the same conversation. By Friday, nobody can say what freight cash left the building.
Single payable is the other road. Transportation invoices are audited to the same rules, then settled in one weekly funds request from one record. Carriers still haul the freight. They do not run your AP. What you are buying is a single story of what moved, what it should have cost, and what left the bank.
What good looks like: one weekly package of approved bills, exceptions, and remittance. Carriers inquire against a record, not a person. You are not paying a bill you already rejected in another system — and you are not training the company to settle by tolerance.
Picture this
Common payables vs single payable
If a carrier is calling your controller about a late invoice, you do not have a carrier problem. You have too many payables.
See also: Settlement · Phone calls · Audit
When you want that number on your own books: the diagnostic.
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