Kolleno Payments
Finance teams waste hours every week on remittance processing—manually extracting invoice data from emails, matching payments to the correct records, and updating general ledger accounts. When a vendor sends an invoice via PDF attachment while another uploads theirs to a portal, and customer payments arrive with incomplete remittance advice, the chaos compounds quickly.
Remittance processing covers three critical steps: Capture (extracting payment and invoice data from various sources), Matching (linking payments to correct invoices or bills), and Posting (updating GL accounts in your ERP). Each step traditionally requires manual intervention that slows your financial close and introduces errors that impact cash flow.
NetSuite offers native automation through Bill Capture and Intelligent Payment Automation. But as transaction volumes grow and complexity increases, finance teams discover gaps that require specialized tools to achieve true straight-through processing.
How to Automate Capture in NetSuite
Capture automation extracts data from invoices, remittance advices, checks, emails, and PDFs without manual data entry. The technology uses optical character recognition and AI to identify vendor names, invoice numbers, line items, amounts, and payment details—transforming time-consuming invoice intake into an automated workflow.
NetSuite Bill Capture
NetSuite Bill Capture eliminates manual invoice entry through AI-powered document processing. Vendors email invoices directly to a NetSuite address, or your team drags and drops documents into the system. The platform extracts vendor name, PO number, items ordered, quantities, and pricing automatically, then populates the bill record for review.
The split-screen interface shows the original invoice alongside the extracted data, making verification quick. Machine learning improves accuracy over time by learning from previous entries and corrections. This automated invoice capture reduces invoice processing time by up to 80% compared to manual data entry.
Email and Upload Methods
NetSuite supports multiple capture methods for processing invoices. Vendors send supplier invoices directly to your dedicated NetSuite email address, where Bill Capture automatically processes attachments. Alternatively, AP staff can drag-and-drop invoices into the system or upload them from their computer.
The Transaction Email Capture SuiteApp must be provisioned and installed before using email capture functionality. Initial setup requires minimal configuration—once enabled, the system processes PDFs and digital invoice image files automatically. There’s no one-time implementation fee for Bill Capture as a standalone module, though NetSuite customers pay standard licensing costs.
On the AR Side
Automated capture handles customer remittance advice from multiple payment channels—email, web portals, check images, EDI. The system aggregates remittance data regardless of format, eliminating the manual work of tracking down payment details across different sources. This streamlines invoice capture for accounts receivable teams processing customer or vendor payments.
Third-party solutions extend capture capabilities with more sophisticated OCR engines. Tools like ZoneCapture, as a native NetSuite application, recognize nearly any field including VAT registration numbers, payment references, and custom fields. Routable and Stampli offer vendor-specific learning that adapts to unique invoice formats without manual template setup.
How to Automate Matching in NetSuite
Matching links payments to the correct invoices, verifies purchase orders against vendor bills, and reconciles bank data with accounting records. Without automation, analysts manually cross-reference documents and investigate discrepancies—work that scales poorly as transaction volumes grow across ERP systems.
Two-Way and Three-Way Matching
NetSuite performs two-way and three-way matching automatically. The system verifies vendor invoices against purchase orders and receiving documents, checking that unit prices, quantities, and totals align. This prevents overpayments, catches duplicate invoices, and flags fraudulent bills before payment—critical controls that improve cash flow management.
After a purchase order, receipt, and bill have been entered into NetSuite, the platform correlates data across these documents. Invoices that fall within approved parameters route directly for invoice approvals. You define tolerance thresholds: minor differences might auto-approve while significant variances require manual review.
Exception Handling
When discrepancies appear—a price mismatch or quantity variance—the system routes exceptions to the appropriate approver rather than processing the payment automatically. You control what happens to exceptions by defining an automated approval workflow that routes all relevant documentation (invoice, PO, goods receipt, team notes) to the proper approver with status tracking throughout the process.
Approvers can review invoice details and sign off with one click on a mobile device or via email through mobile access. Unknown vendor invoices get caught through PO-to-invoice matching, ensuring you know what needs to be paid and when. This automation eliminates payment delays caused by misrouted approvals.
Cash Application and AR Matching
Cash application matches customer payments to open invoices—the most complex matching scenario in remittance processing. Customers rarely make matching simple. They pay multiple invoices with one wire transfer, take deductions without explanation, send partial payments, or provide cryptic references that don’t match invoice numbers.
Manual cash application in NetSuite requires analysts to search for invoices from lists of all open invoices, track down remittance information, and apply it against the correct records. For check payments, users typically integrate with third-party solutions for OCR features. For email remittances, AR staff must read email bodies or open attachments to collate remittance information and manually update accounting data against invoices.
Automated Matching with Third-Party Tools
Third-party AP automation solutions add algorithmic matching that handles more complex scenarios. Routable uses OCR and pattern recognition to link bill lines with PO lines, automatically flagging discrepancies and holding payments for review. This invoice automation reduces operational costs by eliminating manual verification steps.
For cash application, automated systems use AI invoice matching and machine learning to handle complex matching scenarios. The system learns payment patterns, recognizes customer-specific references, and matches payments even when remittance data is incomplete or unstructured. Short payments and consolidated payments that would require hours of manual investigation get resolved automatically—transactions are automatically matched based on AI analysis.
Advanced solutions achieve 90%+ straight-through processing rates by continuously learning from analyst corrections. When the system can’t make a confident match, it flags the exception with suggested resolutions rather than leaving payments unallocated. This protects sensitive data while maintaining data integrity throughout the matching process.
How to Automate Posting in NetSuite
Posting records matched transactions in GL accounts and updates accounts payable and accounts receivable balances. Manual posting creates lag between when finance teams identify matches and when those matches update your financial records—a delay that compounds during month-end close and impacts your ability to review cash positions accurately.
NetSuite Intelligent Payment Automation
NetSuite Intelligent Payment Automation powered by BILL posts payments to GL accounts automatically once approval workflows complete. The system applies role-based approval routing, where payment runs route by amount thresholds with policy-defined limits. After approval, transactions post to the general ledger without additional manual steps—helping you pay vendors on schedule and pay bills efficiently.
The embedded solution handles end-to-end vendor payment processing directly within NetSuite. Self-service onboarding activates payment capabilities in minutes—you connect existing US bank accounts without lengthy setup processes or new banking relationships. This integration with accounting software eliminates the need to toggle between systems.
Key Automated Posting Capabilities
Secure digital payments support ACH, checks, and virtual cards through BILL’s network of 8+ million businesses. Role-based approval workflows route payment runs by amount thresholds, reducing unauthorized transaction risk while maintaining payment velocity. The approval system lets designated team members approve invoices based on predefined rules.
Automated reconciliation and bank matching eliminate manual transaction matching. The system applies payments to GL accounts based on predefined rules, using existing rules and one-to-one matches to keep records current. This bank reconciliation capability provides real-time visibility into payment and account activity without leaving NetSuite.
The remittance voucher system automatically generates and delivers payment details to vendors. For ACH and check payments, vendors receive email notifications with PDF vouchers showing which invoices the payment covers. This transparency strengthens vendor relationships and improves vendor performance by ensuring clear communication about every single invoice payment.
Payment dashboards provide comprehensive status tracking, showing exactly where each vendor bill sits in the payment workflow. Finance teams can monitor key metrics like payment timing and capture early payment discounts when offered by vendors. Vendor records update automatically as payments process, maintaining accurate accounting data across all financial operations.
Real-Time Cash Application Posting
For cash application, automated posting means real-time GL updates as payments get matched. Your accounts receivable balance reflects actual customer payments immediately rather than waiting for batch processing. This gives treasury teams accurate cash positions for daily decision-making and helps optimize cash flow across the organization.
Audit trails capture every transaction, match decision, and posting action. You maintain compliance requirements without building separate documentation processes. The automated bank matching and reconciliation process eliminates the month-end scramble where teams reconcile weeks of transactions in compressed timeframes.
NetSuite Intelligent Payment Automation carries no additional license fees beyond standard NetSuite costs—you pay only BILL’s transaction charges for processed payments and related services. There are no hidden additional NetSuite license fees or complex fee structures—you pay only BILL’s standard transaction charges.
Where NetSuite’s Native Automation Falls Short
NetSuite provides solid remittance processing foundations, but limitations emerge as your business scales. Understanding these gaps helps you identify when specialized tools become necessary rather than optional.
Limited AR Automation
NetSuite offers minimal native capabilities for accounts receivable and cash application. The platform requires manual searching through open invoice lists, manual tracking of remittance information, and manual application of payments against invoices. For high-volume AR operations processing hundreds or thousands of customer payments monthly, this manual workflow creates bottlenecks that delay cash posting and revenue recognition—directly impacting your ability to improve cash flow.
Basic Matching Rules
While NetSuite handles standard two-way and three-way matching for AP, it struggles with complex scenarios. Consolidated customer payments covering multiple invoices, partial payments with incomplete remittance data, and short-pays with unexplained deductions require sophisticated AI and machine learning that NetSuite’s native matching can’t provide. Exception rates remain high without intelligent automation.
Manual Cash Application Processes
The cash application process in NetSuite involves manually downloading bank statements, opening emails with remittance advice, extracting relevant details, and matching these to open invoices in the accounting system. This manual process is highly prone to errors, especially with partial payments, deductions, or missing remittance details. Time spent on cash application increases along with transaction volumes, with increased chance of errors.
Inadequate Multi-Entity Support
Organizations operating across multiple entities, subsidiaries, or business units need sophisticated routing logic and entity-specific workflows. NetSuite’s basic approval routing doesn’t handle the complexity of multi-entity operations where different subsidiaries require different approval hierarchies, GL account structures, and reconciliation rules.
Disconnected Payment Channels
Customer payments arrive through scattered channels—email attachments, customer portals, bank feeds, EDI, lockbox services. NetSuite doesn’t aggregate remittance data from these disparate sources automatically. Your team toggles between systems trying to piece together which payment covers which invoices, work that doesn’t scale as payment channel diversity increases. The inability to match bank data across channels creates reconciliation headaches.
No Learning Capabilities
NetSuite’s matching operates on static rules you define upfront. The system doesn’t learn from corrections, adapt to customer-specific payment patterns, or improve accuracy over time. Every exception requires the same manual investigation whether you’ve seen that scenario once or a hundred times.
Where Kolleno Fits In: Extending NetSuite for AR Automation
Kolleno’s deep NetSuite integration extends your ERP’s capabilities specifically for accounts receivable and cash application—the areas where NetSuite’s native functionality creates the most friction for finance teams.
AI-Powered Remittance Processing
Kolleno’s AI automatically scans uploaded remittance files to detect payment intent. It identifies which invoices customers are promising to pay and creates Promise to Pay records in the system automatically. This removes the lag between receiving a remittance file and updating your cash forecast—no more manually parsing long documents to extract payment commitments.
The AI Timeline Summaries feature generates instant account context by summarizing the latest events and outstanding action points for every customer. Collectors get up to speed immediately without scrolling through months of history, so they can pick up the phone sounding like they’ve been following the account closely.
Intelligent Payment Matching
Unlike NetSuite’s basic matching rules, Kolleno uses AI to match payments to invoices using patterns, payment history, and remittance data. The system handles complex scenarios that break manual workflows: partial payments where customers pay less than the invoice amount, short-pays with deductions, consolidated payments covering multiple invoices with one wire transfer, and payments with incomplete or cryptic remittance references.
Finance teams validate edge cases while the system continuously improves accuracy over time. One-click matching confirms one-to-one, one-to-many, partial payment matches and beyond. The centralized dashboard shows exactly what’s been matched and what needs attention.
Real-Time NetSuite Integration
Direct NetSuite integration ensures two-way sync for seamless reconciliation across ERP, payment processors, and bank feeds. Live reconciliation means payment status information stays current across all platforms automatically, including card and direct debit payments. When payments get matched, GL updates happen in real-time rather than waiting for batch processing.
Set reconciliation rules for payment processors by assigning ledger accounts in your ERP. Payments triggered by Kolleno, including those made via customer payment portal and recurring payments, auto-reconcile without manual intervention.
Reactive Workflows Based on Customer Behavior
Kolleno enables dynamic workflows that activate based on specific customer actions and interactions. You create responsive dunning processes that adapt to how customers engage with your emails and payment portal. The system triggers follow-ups automatically when customers open emails, view invoices, or make promises to pay—creating a collections process that responds to actual behavior rather than running on fixed schedules.
New workflow actions include automated retry for failed payments, exclusion from auto-charge for specific invoices based on custom logic, and automatic internal notes logged to customer records for better audit trails.
Multi-Source Remittance Aggregation
Kolleno captures remittance details from PDFs, emails, and bank feeds, consolidating structured and unstructured data in one place. The platform supports 10,000+ banks globally through API connections, ensuring remittance data flows from any payment channel into a unified system. You gain complete visibility without hunting through email inboxes, downloading portal files, or reconciling multiple data sources manually.
Proven Results
Companies like DNA Payments achieved 34% overdue reduction in just 3 months after implementing Kolleno’s automated remittance processing and cash application. They saw 110% collection increase within 30 days by eliminating manual bottlenecks in their AR workflow. Deliverect reduced overdue balances by 71% within the first 3-6 months through automated collections and intelligent cash application.
Final Thoughts
Remittance processing automation transforms finance operations from reactive transaction processing to strategic financial management. NetSuite provides the foundation with Bill Capture for invoice data extraction and Intelligent Payment Automation for vendor payment execution. These native capabilities handle standard AP workflows effectively.
The gaps appear on the accounts receivable side, where NetSuite’s minimal cash application capabilities force teams into manual processes that don’t scale. As customer payment volumes grow and matching complexity increases, finance teams need specialized AR automation that extends NetSuite’s capabilities rather than replacing them.
Kolleno fills this gap as a Built for NetSuite solution that brings intelligent automation to the complete AR workflow—from remittance capture through payment matching to real-time GL posting. The platform handles the complex scenarios that break manual workflows: consolidated payments, partial payments, incomplete remittance data, and customer-specific payment patterns that require learning rather than static rules.Want to learn more? Book a demo to see how Kolleno works for yourself.
