The honest description of paperless invoice processing is that it does not remove waiting, it makes waiting visible. A paper invoice on somebody's desk and a digital one in somebody's queue are both waiting. The difference is that the second can be counted, aged, chased and reported, and everything that improves afterwards follows from being able to see it.
Visibility first, speed second
Once invoices are in a queue with statuses and ages, you can see which are stuck and with whom. That view is what makes improvement possible, because it turns a general sense that payables is slow into a specific list of ten invoices with three names against them. Speed comes afterwards, from acting on that list rather than from the medium changing.
The record you gain
Digital processing captures the received date, the approval, the coding and the exception reasons as data rather than as marks on paper. That record answers supplier questions, audit questions and duplicate-payment arguments in seconds. It is the durable benefit, and unlike speed it does not depend on anybody changing their behaviour.
What does not improve on its own
An approver who does not respond still does not respond, and an invoice with no purchase order still needs somebody to work out what it is for. Paperless makes both visible without fixing either. Teams that expect the medium to fix behaviour are disappointed; teams that use the visibility to address behaviour are not.
Questions people ask about paperless invoice processing
Will paperless make us faster?
Indirectly. It makes delay visible and attributable, and the speed comes from acting on what you can now see rather than from the absence of paper.
Do we have to go paperless everywhere at once?
No. Scanning at arrival and running everything downstream digitally captures most of the benefit while paper still arrives.
What about legal requirements for original documents?
Retention obligations attach to the record rather than the medium in most cases, but check your own obligations before disposing of originals.