The IRS Standard Mileage rate has been adjusted 1 cent higher for 2018.

Due to the increased costs, the 2018 IRS Mileage rate will be 54.5¢ (Up from 53.5¢ per mile in 2017).

💰 54.5¢ for every mile of business travel driven, up 1 cent from the rate for 2017.
💰 18¢ per mile driven for medical or moving purposes, up 1 cent from the rate for 2017.
💰 14¢ per mile that is driven the service of charitable organizations.

For more information, please review the IRS announcement: 
IRS.GOV

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Robert Ruhno
Director and Blogger
Accounts Payable Professionals Group (APPG)

50,000 Members Strong!

Join Today.

We are excited to announce that this past week we officially crossed the 50,000 members milestone for our Accounts Payable Professionals group. As a group that is free to join and welcomes all new members, we are incredibly proud of our growing community.

Interested in joining? We are available on:

* LinkedIn  | * Google+  | * Twitter | * Facebook  | * Blogger

Cheat Sheet to: Planning your Lunch & Learn meeting

A once a month lunch & learn meeting with your A/P team is a great idea. It is much better than trying to explain things to one person at a time (because you can get everyone onboard, at the same time).

To start, it is always a good idea to create a meeting agenda. One that bullet points the topics that will be discussed. Make sure to hand out this meeting agenda before the meeting (so your people will know what to expect, and can start thinking about the subject ahead of time).

Pick three to five A/P Specific subjects. It is better to go deep into a few subjects and give everyone a good understanding than to try and cover every possible subject.

Here are some ideas for a checklist:

 Create a simple and clear meeting agenda.

 Pick three A/P subjects to discuss in detail 
          (For example:)
       ○ Standard way to enter invoice numbers
       ○ Segregation of duties
       ○ TIN Matching

 Consider making time at the end of the meeting to publicly praise a coworkers performance.
          (For example:)
       ○ Who had the best invoice entry accuracy for the month?
       ○ Who had perfect attendance / always on time?
       ○ Who is going the extra mile on a particular project?
       ○ Etc...

 Ask your coworkers to prepare a mini presentation for next month's meeting.
          (presentation ideas:)
       ○ Where can the AP department improve.
       ○ What are some of your best tricks to do things faster (i.e. keyboard shortcuts, etc.)
       ○ What three A/P items should we discuss at the next meeting?

The 3 most important A/P Best Practices tips ever!

Let's open up a discussion on A/P Best Practices. What are your favorite ones? Which are the ones that you consider to be a must?

There are many best practices tips, but here are three that come to my mind at the moment:

1. Have a standard way of entering invoice numbers: Do you include leading zeros? Do you include dashes or other symbols? or leave them off? Either way can be fine, as long as it becomes the standard, and everyone follows this rule. If you don't have a standard for this, you will end up with duplicate payments.

2. Segregation of duties: It is best to have one person to set up vendors and a different person to enter invoices. This practice cuts down on the possibility of fraud. 

3. TIN Matching of all W9 forms: Before setting up a new vendor, you receive a W9 form. It is a great idea to check the validity of the TIN number and Vendor name using the free service from the IRS: TIN Matching.

Now your turn (I am reaching out to all you experts!)

What makes a great Lunch & Learn meeting? What are some great ideas for A/P Best practice tips? Share with us some of your wisdom in the comment section below!

Connect today

If you are new to Accounts Payable and want to up your game, you need to connect to our AP community online. Make sure to follow Accounts Payable Professionals Group on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Pinterest, and our blog: ap-professionals.com. You will find a continuous flow of new articles, news, job postings, and interactions with other Accounts Payable Professionals. Also, feel free to reach out to me directly! I love to help my peers whenever possible.
Cheers,

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Robert Ruhno
Director of Socia Media
Accounts Payable Professionals Group (APPG)

The Steps to becoming an Accounts Payable Professional

Being an Accounts Payable Professional is a state of mind. It is a desire to be the best at what you do and the realization that your job is more than just paying bills. An Accounts Payable Professional wants to raise the standards and learn what the best practices are (and implement best practices in their office). 

So here are the steps:

Step 1: Get paid for working on an Accounts Payable related job.

Step 2: Join the Accounts Payable Professionals group and interact with your peers, read discussion posts, and sign up for webinars (many are free).

Step 3: Get your company to pay for your AP Certification.

Step 4: Attend AP Conferences and keep up-to-date on current AP issues and technology.

Connect today

If you are new to Accounts Payable and want to up your game, you need to connect to our AP community online. Make sure to follow Accounts Payable Professionals Group on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Pinterest, and our blog: ap-professionals.com. You will find a continuous flow of new articles, news, job postings, and interactions with other Accounts Payable Professionals. Also, feel free to reach out to me directly! I love to help my peers whenever possible.

Cheers,

---

Robert Ruhno
Director of Socia Media
Accounts Payable Professionals Group (APPG)

2017 Game Changer Awards: vote for your favorite accounting technology

At Institute of Finance & Management (IOFM), we believe that success in business relies heavily on developing efficient business processes. Successful organizations are continually seeking better accounting software, and finance professionals are always striving to keep up with the latest solutions in the marketplace. To assist members of the finance and management community with finding the latest, greatest, and truly game-changing apps – IOFM is pleased to announce the first annual Game Changer Awards of 2017.

This new award program recognizes the top 5 companies with solutions that provide value to our profession. The Game Changer Awards showcase companies that provide the most productive and effective technologies and meet the highest standards of design, ease-of-use, and conformance with appropriate accounting standards.

At the link below, you'll find our list of 44 finalists. Is your favorite software solution among them? Let us know who you think is at the top by voting today:

http://iofm.com/conference-spring/vote-game-changers/

R.O.W.E. (Results Only Work Environment)

Time Waits for No One - by Keshida Layone (http://www.keshidalayone.com/)

Why does everyone work an 8 hour day in the United States? Is it really the case that a doctor, a plumber, an office worker, and a truck driver all require exactly 8 hours to do their work? There is another way.

Using results only work environment or Rowe for short, employees are paid for their actual work done instead of the number of hours that they are at their work location. I remember in my first job out of high school waiting alongside the rest of my department next to the punch clock 15 minutes before it was 5 o'clock. The last 15 to 30 minutes of that day was completely unproductive about the company and for its employees since everyone was just waiting around for the clock to say 5 p.m. so we can all go home. Thinking back now it was such a silly waste of time.

Instead of work being based on time, a much more efficient strategy is work based on tasks and goals that need to be accomplished.

I found this great Youtube interview of one of the creators of the ROWE, Jody Thompson:

Do you know of someone who works in a ROWE?
Would a ROWE be a good idea for your company?