AP best practice is a short list that most organisations already know and few write down. One arrival point with the date recorded. A status, an owner and an age on everything. Exceptions routed by reason to whoever can resolve them. Bank detail changes verified through a channel you already hold. And supplier statements reconciled for the suppliers who send you the most invoices.
Make the queue visible
A short fixed list of statuses, a named owner rather than a team on each item, and an age from when it entered its current state. Weekly, look at the oldest three items in each state and chase those specifically rather than sending everybody a list of everything.
Push the exceptions to where the knowledge is
Price variances belong with purchasing, missing receipts with whoever takes deliveries, supplier problems with whoever maintains records. Payables acting as intermediary for all of them is slow and puts the resolution furthest from the person who knows the answer.
Protect the payment step
Release of a payment run by somebody other than its preparer, and verification of bank detail changes through contact details you already hold. These two controls guard the losses that actually happen, and both lapse most often during absence rather than by design.
Report the numbers that change other people
The count of invoices arriving without a purchase order, by department, and the share arriving with a recorded goods receipt. Those two describe the upstream behaviour that sets payables' workload, and presenting them as a shared measure rather than a complaint is what gets them acted on.
Questions people ask about ap best practices
What should be reviewed weekly?
Counts by status and the age of the oldest item in each, with an owner's name. Two small tables that take minutes to produce and catch problems while they are still small.
What should be reviewed monthly?
The exception reason mix and the share of invoices arriving with an order and a receipt behind them. Those two change what other departments do rather than describing payables to itself.
Which practice is skipped most?
Supplier statement reconciliation, because it is tedious. It is also the most reliable way to find invoices raised against you that never reached your system.