This article is brought to you by Square 9.

As convenience stores scale operations, the sheer volume of invoices from suppliers each week can quickly become overwhelming to process, said Stephen Young, president and CEO at Square 9.

During the payables process, each invoice needs to be matched to an existing purchase order and delivery ticket, approved by management, paid and archived. “What’s more, much of the data on these invoices must be manually entered into an ERP system to support other processes. With all this time-consuming work, it’s no wonder manual processing leads to delays, costly errors and frustration for store managers and back-office teams alike,” he said.

To simplify this time-consuming, costly work, Young said that many c-stores are turning to AI-driven accounts payable automation, like the Square 9 Softworks gen-AI powered platform, to “extract crucial information and route invoices across systems, departments and locations.”

Regardless of document format or how an invoice arrives, trade and non-trade invoices are read and contextualized by AI. The platform classifies, validates and routes them in seconds, Young explained. “Once verified, invoice data flows seamlessly into your ERP of choice, including PDI, a well-known platform within the fuel and convenience industry. After data is extracted and routed, the invoices themselves follow a flexible path through matchers, approvers and more based on your business’s needs.”

By eliminating manual keying, routing and double data entry, stores drastically increase productivity, he said, adding that automated matching against purchase orders and bills of lading ensures pricing consistency while managers gain real-time visibility into payables, empowering better cash-flow forecasting and vendor management. In fact, AP automation can process invoices as much as 90% faster than manual effort.

“With modern innovations, implementation can be refreshingly simple. No-code workflows and integrations let operations stay focused on serving customers rather than configuring software,” Young said. “Amid rising labor costs and tighter margins, efficiency is becoming increasingly crucial. AI-powered automation gives convenience stores the tools they need to keep costs low and operations running smoothly.”

“Square 9 is PDI’s preferred partner for intelligent document processing,” said Young. “The Square 9 platform captures your unstructured content, transforms it into clean, searchable data and securely shares it across your organization to accelerate your decisions and actions.”

Learn more about how AI can automate back-office tasks in part two of this two-part series, brought to you by Square 9.