We've all been there. The semester's ending, you're trying to close the books, and suddenly you get an email about an unpaid invoice. Your desk is already piled high with paper invoices waiting for approvals, and another pile that hasn’t even been entered into your system yet.
This isn't a one-off occurrence. For many higher education finance teams, it's just another day.
Even with Workday streamlining your campus operations, accounts payable (AP) often remains stuck in the past. The constant paper chase. The endless approval follow-ups. The panicked vendor calls. They've all become a headache-inducing part of your daily routine.
The good news? You're not alone. There's a better way: AP automation.
The Higher Ed Finance Challenge
University finance departments face different challenges than other businesses. Your team handles everything from student payments and research grants to department budgets and vendor relationships. And this is often all done with systems that weren't built for how higher education actually works.
Workday is an incredible platform that gives you a solid foundation, but many schools find themselves missing one key element: a truly efficient accounts payable workflow.
What makes higher education AP so challenging?
- Multiple funding sources with different rules
- Departments that buy things differently
- Seasonal spending that creates processing bottlenecks
- Complex compliance requirements for grants and state funding
Adding AP automation that works with your existing Workday system can transform disjointed, manual processes into smooth workflows that save time, reduce errors, and free your team to focus on work that actually matters.
Ready to see if it's time for your school to make the change? Here are five signs you need to integrate AP automation within your Workday system:
1. Your AP Team Spends More Time Chasing than Processing
Does your finance staff find themselves switching between email folders, shared drives, and spreadsheets just to track down basic invoice information?
If your team's spending more time tracking down invoices than actually closing them out, your processes need an update. This fragmented approach wastes time and creates unnecessary stress during key periods, like the end of your fiscal year or when a grant report is due.
Integrating AP automation can make your experience better by:
- Automatically capturing invoices from multiple sources
- Extracting data without manual entry
- Freeing your team to focus on more strategic tasks
- Reducing errors that lead to payment headaches or strained vendor relationships
With automation, your finance team can focus less on repetitive processes and more on analyzing spending patterns, finding ways to save money across departments, and other strategic tasks.
2. Vendor Relationships Feel More Strained than Seamless
We've all been there: An invoice slips through the cracks, resulting in a late payment and an unhappy vendor.
Payment issues most often stem from processing delays or bottlenecks in your approval process — not from a lack of funds. And when your finance team doesn’t have a clear view of where each invoice stands or when it will be paid, it’s hard to manage expectations or resolve disputes quickly.
Pairing Workday with an automation tool designed specifically for AP helps you make sure your vendors are paid on time, every time. That’s because AP automation gives you better visibility into each invoice’s lifecycle, so you can:
- Easily navigate payment timelines
- Setup approval reminders
- Know where approvals stand
- Take advantage of early payment discounts
This not only improves your vendor relationships, but makes them stronger over time.
3. Audit Season Feels Like a Campus-Wide Scavenger Hunt
For universities receiving public funding, federal grants, or other forms of aid, financial transparency isn't optional. Yet many institutions still find themselves approaching audits and reporting like last-minute emergency drills. In these critical moments, the frantic questions begin to fly:
"Who approved this invoice?"
"Where's the audit trail for this payment?"
"Which budget did this come from?"
When records live in different places – some digital, some in filing cabinets, some in email threads – even routine questions can trigger days of searching (and of stress!).
Integrating automation tools with Workday creates a completely different experience. Automation makes everything faster and more efficient by giving your team:
- A digital trail for every transaction, from receipt to payment
- Centralized digital storage for all documentation
- Easy access to approval histories and user actions
- Consistent enforcement of policies and procedures
With AP automation, your next audit becomes a seamless part of your day-to-day workflow, rather than a recurring crisis.
4. Approval Workflows Have More Exceptions than Rules
One department wants multi-level approvals. Another wants to skip them altogether for grants under a certain threshold. A third insists on flagging every invoice related to a specific project. Sound familiar?
Higher education institutions have complex approval systems that often change between departments, funding sources, or expense types. And when your AP system can't handle these differences, people find workarounds, which can create inconsistent practices and compliance risks.
With the right integrations for AP, you can meet everyone's needs by:
- Designing flexible approval flows for different departments
- Creating special rules for grant- or federally-funded purchases
- Automatically flagging inconsistencies or errors
Integrated AP automation tools, like Nimbello, work with your Workday system to support even the most complex needs without forcing your school into a one-size-fits-all approach.
5. You're Ready to be Less Reactive and More Proactive
The most telling sign that it’s time to automate AP? You’re tired of being reactive.
When finance teams spend their days chasing paperwork and handling approvals, they can't work on bigger projects. Manually entering invoices, chasing down approvals, or dealing with an ever-growing backlog become the norm, while questions about spending patterns, vendor performance, and future planning get ignored.
It doesn't have to be this way. By implementing AP automation within your university's Workday system, you create more time for:
- Data-driven analysis of spending
- Strategic vendor management
- Stronger cash flow forecasting and planning
- Uncovering cost-saving initiatives that benefit the entire campus
AP automation turns your finance operations from a paper-pushing factory into a source of valuable insights and smart planning.
Nimbello's Here to Transform Your Workday AP Experience
At Nimbello, we understand that higher education isn't like other industries.
That's why we've worked with schools of all sizes to create a Workday integration specifically for you. Our team of experts knows how to navigate the nuances of academia and how to work with you to understand your campus's unique needs.
Whether you're a big research university with thousands of vendors or a smaller school with a small-but-mighty team, Nimbello's AP automation solutions for Workday can fit seamlessly into your existing workflow.
Ready to bring the power of AP automation into your school's Workday environment? Contact Nimbello today to get started!