How to Move Your Accounts Receivable Team to Versapay in Just 90 Days

For many accounts receivable (AR) teams, automation has already become the status quo. But if your existing AR automation platform is falling short around customer adoption, user experience, or responsiveness, you may be ready for a change. 

The good news: migrating from another AR automation solution to Versapay is easy—and can take as little as 90 days. If you’re using a file-based integration to connect with your enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, the work involved with formatting your data is already done—cutting a labor-intensive step out of the implementation process.  

“If you’re passing a file to your current automation solution, and you’re getting a file back, you don’t need to change anything with Versapay, other than where you’re dropping and pulling the files from,” says John Warner, VP of Solutions Engineering & Delivery at Versapay.  

Here's how that works, and how to avoid some common hold-ups in the migration process.

Versapay allows you to accept payment types across your ecommerce, point-of-sale, and accounts receivable channels, linking them directly into your ERP. This helps you lower your processing costs and reduce the number of manual processes you use. 

An integration with your ERP is a key part of that, and critical to your Versapay implementation as a whole. But to ensure a successful integration, your data must be standardized and records clean, so data can flow in and out of your ERP with ease. In a traditional Versapay implementation, where AR automation is being introduced from scratch, this stage may require more assistance from internal IT teams or external consultants. 

If you’re migrating from another AR automation solution, however, you’ll have done most of that work already, meaning many of those steps are avoidable. This turns a longer implementation into one that takes you from contract-to-cash in just 90 days, with minimal IT involvement. 

If you employ a file-based data integration in your current environment, there is likely no need to change what you already export. Versapay can work with the same approach, moving your entire data environment. Otherwise known as a “lift-and-shift,” this process allows you to get up and running quickly. At the same time, it takes the burden off your IT team, typically requiring only one to two days of their time over the course of the migration. 

“You’re getting all the goodness of Versapay, but don’t have to do a whole bunch of work on your side,” John says. “The project goes faster and it’s less expensive.”

While a 90 day migration is standard, there are potential scenarios that could slow down your implementation. A clear understanding of your roadmap and potential roadblocks early on will help you plan for them and determine a go-live date that matches the priorities and realities of your business environment.

If you want to add real-time data exchange at the same time as your initial migration, a file-based data integration might not be the right fit for you. An application programming interface (API) based data exchange will enable this, creating two-way data syncing. An API-based data setup goes beyond the limits of a lift-and-shift, requiring additional IT resources and time.

Talk to the Versapay team. Depending on your priorities, they may recommend that you migrate using a lift-and-shift model to start, to get you up and running quickly. At that point, you can invest time and resources into modernizing your data environment. 

“Once you’re up and running, we can pick and choose where you want real-time data exchange,” John says. “You can plan it out more easily.”

While migrating cash application automation doesn’t require any additional resources from Versapay or your IT team, it does require involvement from your bank. They will need to reroute files to your new system. But your bank’s team has its own timelines and priorities, which can slow your migration down. 

“Sometimes we have to wait a month or two for the bank to set up the secure file transfer protocol (SFTP) folders and get those connections going,” John says. “That's the only thing that’s out of our control.”

Get in touch with your bank early on in the migration process—or even before your migration has officially begun. This will give them plenty of time to assign a team and initiate the project on their end.

The final phase before you go live with Versapay will be user acceptance testing (UAT), which allows business users to try out your new payment environment against real-world scenarios. It’s a critical part of the migration process. 

Testing is built into our 90 day timeline, and usually happens within 30 days of the migration commencing. But UAT does require your business users to invest time away from their day-to-day tasks, so a lack of availability or bandwidth can sometimes slow this phase down.

Assign an internal project manager who understands the day-to-day responsibilities and schedules of your team. This can help you better schedule your UAT appropriately.

The Versapay team partners closely with our customers to help them succeed, offering hands-on support as you map your migration path, guiding you through any potential disruptions and speeding up time-to-value. 

This means that as you migrate from another AR automation partner onto Versapay, we’ll ensure the data environment you have in place meets the needs of our automation environment. A dedicated project manager and technical lead will help keep the project on schedule, personally tailoring their approach to your preferences and business roadmap. And our customer support team will ensure you’re using all the features you can to meet your goals, identifying any modernization needs going forward.

“Even after you’re live, our team continues to make sure everything’s going well, and no issues or questions remain,” John says.

Versapay can often work with the file-based integration approach you already use today, limiting disruption to your ERP.

The majority of migrations to Versapay only take 1 to 2 days of IT time. The migration is designed to minimize the burden on your IT team, especially when we can work from your current exports and imports.

Yes. You can start with batch files and move to APIs when ready.

You can still begin evaluating options, mapping the migration path, and building internal alignment so you’re ready to move when the timing is right.

Versapay is designed to support core receivables workflows and matches or improves on the key capabilities of your current platform.

Migrating from another AR automation solution to Versapay can take as little as 90 days