AI Lab
Opportunity Intelligence
How a first assessment works: from a business problem, through the questions that matter, to a structured view of where AI or automation could help, what it might be worth, and what to test first.
About this tool: Worked examples prepared by Plerosis. Not generated live, and not based on real clients. Each statement is tagged as a fact from the brief, a calculation, or an assumption to test.
The brief
A UK wholesale distributor with about 60 staff. A finance team of four handles around 1,500 supplier invoices a month.
“Our finance team spends days each month chasing invoices that don’t match purchase orders.”
Follow-up question 1
How are invoices received and entered today?
By email as PDFs, keyed into the accounting system by hand, about 8 minutes each.
Follow-up question 2
What usually causes a mismatch?
Price or quantity differences against the purchase order, and occasional duplicates. Around 4% of invoices need rework.
Follow-up question 3
What does a mismatch cost you?
Staff time to investigate, supplier calls and sometimes late-payment charges: roughly £60 each.
The report
The strongest opportunity is automated invoice capture with rule-based matching, with people handling only the exceptions. It is a well-proven pattern with clean, structured data.
Automated capture and PO matching
- Feasibility
- High
- Data needed
- Invoice PDFs, purchase orders, goods received notes
- Integration
- Reads the invoice inbox; writes to the accounting system
- Governance
- People approve every exception; full audit trail
Exception triage assistant
- Feasibility
- Medium
- Data needed
- History of past mismatches and how they were resolved
- Integration
- Read-only access to accounting records
- Governance
- Suggestions only; a person decides
Supplier master data checks
- Feasibility
- High
- Data needed
- Supplier records, bank and VAT details
- Integration
- Accounting system
- Governance
- Changes to bank details always verified by a person
Value estimate: change any number
Net annual benefit
Calculated£49,600
- Payback
- 8.5 months
- 3-year net return
- £113,800
- Staff hours released a year
- 1,200
If the time saving is half what was assumed: £31,600 a year.
Suggested proof of concept
Run automated capture and matching on one month of historical invoices, in parallel with the current process.
- Success criteria
- At least 90% of fields read correctly; every true mismatch flagged; no invoice posted without a match or a person’s approval.
- Decision at the end
- Implement, refine the rules, or stop.
Assumptions to test
The 50% time saving depends on invoice layout consistency across suppliers; implementation cost depends on the accounting system’s integration options.