Sage North America today announced high-level findings from Aberdeen Group's recently published third annual payments report, titled "Global Payments: Maximizing Cash Flow with Electronic Payments and Process Automation." According to the report, leading companies are employing electronic payments and process automation to streamline and accelerate finance processes, reduce operating costs, and improve visibility, control, and efficiency to provide a foundation for increased profits.

"Despite the reign of the paper check and manual-based processes in business-to-business transactions in the U.S. and many parts of the world, economic and efficiency gains from automating the financial supply chain-from invoicing through payment settlement-are key motivators for demand and supply to align," said Nasreen Quibria, senior analyst at Aberdeen and author of the report. "While the adoption of electronic payment vehicles requires businesses to alter their payment behavior and restructure their financial processes, companies that can make the shift will gain competitive advantage."

Reflecting the unpredictable economic conditions of the past year, Aberdeen found that companies are focused on maximizing cash flow and taking a holistic approach to transactions-examining the flow of funds into Accounts Receivable (AR), and outflow of funds from Accounts Payable (AP).

In its survey of more than 160 companies worldwide, Aberdeen found that businesses adopting electronic channels have been able to achieve a 16% decrease in accounts receivable (AR) processing cost, and a 14% decrease in accounts payable (AP) costs year over year.

"Aberdeen's report shows the value that systems interoperability with electronic payment networks has for both buyers and suppliers," said Greg Hammermaster, president of Sage Payment Solutions, the payments division for Sage North America. "We believe this interoperability is critical toward achieving three major payments objectives for every business: improving cash flow, reducing costs, and maximizing the utility of their ERP environment."

The Aberdeen survey identified two main pressures creating the need for improved payments processing:

• Corporate mandate to reduce overall payment transaction costs, such as staff and processing (65%); and
• Stakeholder demand for improved operational efficiency, such as reduced reliance on paper documents (47%).

Also, according to Aberdeen, 50% of best-in-class companies integrate their electronic payment solutions with their accounting, enterprise resource planning (ERP), or other financial systems. At the same time, 39% of best-in-class companies identify a lack of integration between electronic payments and accounting systems as a barrier to increased electronic payments.

Last month, Sage introduced Sage Exchange, a new secure, Payment Application Data Security Standard (PA-DSS) certified payment platform that will allow businesses and organizations to accept all forms and methods of payment, with seamless data integration to a wide range of Sage business management software products and third-party business solutions. Seamless integration between payment applications and back-office software can improve an organization's cash flow and forecasting, while eliminating manual data entry and the risk of errors.

"Integrating electronic payment networks with back office ERP systems is a challenge faced by all businesses," added Hammermaster. "Sage Exchange overcomes this challenge by tightly integrating Sage's accounting and ERP solutions, on both the AR and AP sides, with the most widely used electronic payment networks, including credit and debit cards, electronic check, ACH, and even private label networks. While electronic payments data integration is the foundation, exponential value will be gained through a suite of connected services focused on streamlining the financial supply chain. Sage Exchange is set to deliver on that value proposition."

Aberdeen's payments study was co-underwritten by Sage Payment Solutions and Syncada. A joint venture between Visa and U.S. Bank, Syncada provides a business-to-business network for financial institutions to enable their clients to increase control over their financial supply chains.

Sometimes the path from takeoff to the estimate can be a tedious one in the construction industry. Compiling costs from a variety of different sources and attempting to bring them all together with complete accuracy can be tricky, especially if it's being done the old-fashioned way-on paper.

But with technology being introduced into the space all the time-specifically designed to help speed up the takeoff process-complete accuracy and a quicker path to an estimate is possible. One way to speed up the process is to combine both the takeoff and estimate processes into a single solution.

A good example of this is the recent partnership between software providers PlanSwift, Henderson, Nev., and Sage, Beaverton, Ore. Through this collaboration the two companies will introduce a complete takeoff and estimating solution to the construction industry-PlanSwift for Sage.

At its annual Insights conference held in Denver last month, business management software vendor, Sage, announced new partner workshops and resources, as well as enhancements to its existing channel initiatives to help make partners more profitable.

This year's Insights conference marked the last partner-specific event to be hosted by Sage, because starting next year, the vendor will put on a combined partner and customer conference event, known as Sage Summit.

Tom Miller, vice-president of channel management for Sage North America, has been the company's channel chief for just over a year now. Prior to Sage, Miller worked at Microsoft for eight years. Reflecting back over year one, Miller said he's "pleased" with the progress the company's made with its channel thus far.

"I'm pleased with the progress we've made but I think we still have a lot of work to do." Miller said. "We need to make sure we have the right sets of programs for our partners and help them find new customers and opportunities. We also have to get communications out to our partners and provide training so we're all partner-ready. I'm confident that we can get there, but it's an evolving work in progress."

Among some of the new partner offerings are four workshops around sales, consulting, customer experience and business strategy.

Miller said when he joined Sage last summer and had a look at the existing programs, one of the improvements he wanted to make was increasing the number of partners participating in them.

"We found that some of these programs were too expensive from a time and out-of-pocket standpoint," Miller explained. "Partners also wanted a more condensed version that was offered closer to home."

To give partners more of what they wanted, Miller said Sage introduced its sales, consulting and customer experience workshops. The sales workshop is a free, one-day intensive selling workshop to help partners improve on their sales performance. The consulting workshop, which is also free, is designed to help partners further develop their business and consulting skills. And lastly, the customer experience workshop is a free two session workshop that coaches partners on customer experience and also on developing specific skills in order to better serve their end-user customers.

Sage North America announced today its Construction and Real Estate group has entered into an agreement with Tech Unlimited, Inc., to distribute PlanSwift and PlanSwift for Sage 2D construction takeoff solutions. PlanSwift allows builders to calculate and takeoff dimensions electronically using digital plans. PlanSwift for Sage, offered only through Sage, integrates exclusively with Sage's Estimating Standard and Extended products giving Sage customers enhanced productivity and cost-savings. Tech Unlimited, Inc. is a leading provider of electronic plan takeoff for construction industry professionals. Sage Construction and Real Estate product lines have been recognized as the most widely used applications for construction estimating, job costing, accounting, payroll, and project management, according to the Construction Financial Management Association's (CFMA) 2010 Information Technology Survey for the Construction Industry.

"As the construction industry fights to regain its lost footing from the economic downturn, builders need every opportunity to drive efficiency into the business. The combination of PlanSwift and Sage's Estimating Standard and Extended products creates a powerful offering that provides builders with an easy to use, cost effective and streamlined process from plans to estimate," said Jim Walter, vice president of development, Sage Construction and Real Estate. "Today's announcement further communicates our commitment to the construction industry by offering a wide range of estimating tools designed to help increase accuracy and productivity."

PlanSwift and PlanSwift for Sage help construction industry professionals:

• Save time and increase productivity using electronic plans and digital takeoff tools
• Reduce costs by eliminating the cost of duplicating and shipping paper plans
• Improve collaboration using comparative overlays and the ability to share and email plans and supporting job details

"Our customers continue to look for ways to leverage technology to cost-effectively and efficiently address industry challenges," said Jon Newsom of Contractor Business Solutions NW, a Sage CRE Business Partner. "The integration of PlanSwift and Sage's suite of construction-specific solutions allows us to present a unique offering to our customers that will empower them to bid projects faster, more accurately and take their estimating processes to the next level."

By offering PlanSwift and PlanSwift for Sage, Sage Construction and Real Estate continues its commitment to provide construction industry professionals cost-effective solutions that support mission-critical operations such as estimating. These powerful tools help estimators bid and win more work without adding overhead.

"At PlanSwift, our number one objective is to streamline the estimating process and we feel that our ultra tight integration with Sage Timberline Office Estimating provides contractors with the complete solution," said James Purpura, PlanSwift's President/COO.

Pricing and Availability
PlanSwift and PlanSwift for Sage are now available through Sage Construction and Real Estate business partners. These offerings are great options for customers needing a cost effective, easy to use electronic takeoff solution, providing the speed and accuracy of electronic takeoff to customers who previously couldn't afford it.