By use case: Order to cash
Order to cash automation, from order to money in the bank.
Orders entered once, fulfilment visible to everyone, invoices raised the moment goods leave, payments matched as they land and reminders sent before anyone has to ask.
- First workflow live
- Order capture, usually inside the first sprint
- Usually owned by
- Operations and dispatch managers
- Built on
- Zoho Books / Tally, Xero, QuickBooks
- Judged on
- Order entry and Dispatch to invoice
In short
Order to cash automation connects every step from order to payment. Orders are captured once and checked for credit and stock, fulfilment and dispatch are tracked, the invoice is raised from the dispatch event in your accounting system, payments are matched to invoices, and reminders escalate by age. Disputes and credit decisions stay with people.
Who this is for
The people who usually own order to cash.
- Operations and dispatch managers
- Finance managers and credit controllers
- Sales coordinators who take orders
- Owners of distributors and manufacturers
Is this you?
If three of these sound like your week, this page is about your team.
- Orders are typed into more than one system
- Status questions are answered by phone
- Invoices go out days after goods leave
- Payments are matched by hand at month end
- Overdue customers still get new orders without a check
What it costs today
Where order to cash loses the hours.
Orders entered more than once
An order taken by phone or WhatsApp, written down, typed into a sheet and then into the accounting system.
Nobody knows where an order is
Sales, the warehouse and the customer each have a different answer, so status is a phone call.
Invoices go out days after dispatch
Billing waits for paperwork to reach accounts, so cash arrives later than it should.
Collections depend on memory
Payments matched by hand, overdue accounts chased when someone notices, and credit given to customers already late.
For operations and finance
Dispatched today. Invoiced today.
Bring one order from last week. We will trace it from first message to payment and show where it waited.
Trace an order with us
By company size
Order to cash at 10 people, and at 1,000.
- 1 to 10
Orders in WhatsApp, invoices typed at night, payments checked against the bank app.
- 11 to 50
An order sheet, a warehouse that hears by phone, and invoices raised days later.
- 51 to 200
Several order channels, a busy dispatch floor, and a receivables list nobody has time to chase.
- 201 to 1,000
Branches and warehouses, credit limits checked by hand, and reconciliation running a month behind.
What we build
What we build for order to cash teams.
- 01
Order capture and checks
Orders from email, WhatsApp, forms or sales reps entered once in an order app, with stock and credit checked before they are confirmed. AI can read orders from free text for a person to confirm.
- 02
Fulfilment and dispatch tracking
Each order moves through picking, dispatch and delivery in one place, with the customer notified at the steps that matter.
- 03
Invoice from dispatch
The dispatch event raises the invoice in your accounting system with the right customer, prices and tax, then sends it.
- 04
Reconciliation and collections
Incoming payments matched to open invoices, exceptions listed, and reminders that escalate by age and stop when payment clears.
The workflows
The order to cash workflows, and what sets each one off.
- 01 Order capture
When an order arrives by email, WhatsApp or form
ThenOrder created, stock and credit checked
- 02 Credit hold
When order exceeds the customer’s limit or they are overdue
ThenHeld and sent to credit control to release
- 03 Dispatch notification
When order dispatched
ThenCustomer told by WhatsApp or email with delivery details
- 04 Invoice on dispatch
When dispatch confirmed
ThenInvoice raised in the accounting system and sent
- 05 Payment reminders
When invoice passes its due date
ThenReminder sent, escalating by age, stopping on payment
The numbers we move
How a order to cash build is judged.
Every build has a number written into the blueprint. These are the ones order to cash builds are measured by, and how we measure them.
| Metric | Before | After | How it is measured |
|---|---|---|---|
| Order entry | Typed two or three times | Entered once | Manual entry points per order, from the process map |
| Dispatch to invoice | Days | Same day | Time from dispatch event to invoice sent |
| Days sales outstanding | Chased by memory | Chased on schedule | Receivables divided by daily sales, monthly |
| Unmatched payments | Matched at month end | Matched on arrival, exceptions listed | Share of payments matched without a person |
Built on
The tools you already run, where we can.
-
Zoho Books -
Tally -
Xero - QuickBooks
- SAP Business One
-
Retool -
WhatsApp Business API -
n8n -
Make
Every tool we connect has its own page in the integrations directory.
Proof
Proof from builds like this.
- Customer story
Order and dispatch management system
Order, enquiry and dispatch management for a building materials supplier moved from Excel to a Retool app, with Zoho Books invoicing and WhatsApp notifications.
Read the story - Customer story
Enquiry and quotation platform on SAP
Enquiries tracked through to order on SAP for an industrial distributor, the front end of the same cycle.
Read the story - Customer story
Multi-user production dashboard
A live operations dashboard for a manufacturer, the kind of view order to cash reporting feeds.
Read the story
How it starts
An audit of the order to cash work your team still does by hand.
One to two weeks. We map the workflows, put an hours-a-week figure on each, and give you a costed blueprint in order of payback. The audit is credited in full to the build.
- Week 1 to 2Audit. We sit with the people who do the work and map it.
- Week 3Blueprint. Fixed scope, fixed price, the first build chosen by payback.
- Week 4 onBuild in two-week sprints, working software every second Friday.
- After go-liveSixty days of hypercare, then a care plan or run it yourself.
What this does not do
So the scope is clear before the call.
- Replacing your ERP or accounting system.
- Debt collection agencies or legal recovery. We chase on schedule and hand disputes to your team.
- Pure ecommerce checkouts, where the platform already runs order to cash.
Terms, defined
Order to cash terms, in plain English.
- Order to cash
- Every step from receiving an order to the payment being received and reconciled.
- Days sales outstanding
- How many days of sales are sitting unpaid in receivables on average.
- Credit hold
- Stopping an order until someone confirms the customer can be given more credit.
Questions
What people ask about order to cash automation.
Do we have to replace our ERP or accounting system?
No. Your ERP or accounting system stays the ledger. We build the order app, the tracking and the automations around it, and write orders, invoices and payments into it through its API.
Does it decide who gets credit?
It applies the limits you set and holds orders that exceed them. Whether to release a held order is a person’s decision, made with the customer’s balance and history in front of them.
Which part should we automate first?
Usually the step where the most time or cash is stuck: invoicing from dispatch if billing lags, or reconciliation and reminders if receivables are ageing. The Automation Audit, $500 and credited to the build, measures this before anything is built.
What does order to cash automation cost?
Workflow automation starts at $1,500, an internal order app at $3,000, and a multi-module system across several warehouses or an older ERP at $5,000. The fixed price is set after the $500 audit. See /guides/how-much-does-ai-automation-cost/ for detail.
Reading
- Pricing
The Zapier tax in 2026: what a 20-person team pays
Zapier now bills tasks, AI steps by model tier, and Agents in activities. A worked bill for a 20-person company, and what the same workflows cost on n8n.
- Systems
Invoice intake with an agent: the first thirty days
The first month of an invoice intake agent from the inside: how the queue behaves, which invoices escalate, and the three settings that decide whether it lasts.
- Operations
Who noticed when the workflow stopped?
Most automation failures are silent: the run shows green and nothing happens for weeks. How it happens in Zapier and n8n, its cost, and the four checks we add.
Related
- Industry
Distribution and logistics
Collections on a schedule, proof of delivery the same day, one stock count across every channel, and customers who hear before they ask.
- Function
Finance and accounting
Close faster, chase less, and see the numbers without waiting for month end.
- Use case
Invoice processing
Supplier invoices read as they arrive, matched to the order and the goods received, approved by the right person and posted to your accounting system. People only see the ones that do not match.
- Use case
Inventory sync
One stock figure, kept right on every shop, marketplace, ERP and warehouse you sell through.
By use case: Invoice processing, Lead routing, Customer onboarding, Employee onboarding, Quote generation, Ticket triage, Document extraction, Approval workflows, Inventory sync, Weekly reporting, Client portals
Order to cash
Get the order to cash hours back.
Bring the one order to cash workflow your team still runs by hand. You leave the call with a yes or no on fit and the first thing we would build.
Book the call