NACM's July Survey, which asked "What percentage of your company's invoices need to be adjusted due to disputes, corrections or other issues?," showed that adjustments were manageable, but constant sources of frustration for credit professionals. A large majority of respondents (72%) noted that only 0-10% of their company's invoices needed to be adjusted due to disputes and other issues, but in a follow-up survey, it was revealed that the real percentage of invoices adjusted was even lower than "0-10%" suggests.

The second survey was only sent to the 72% of respondents who answered "0-10%" in the initial July survey, which amounted to around 1700 people. According to the results of the follow-up, 31% of these respondents noted that, in reality, less than 1% of their company's invoices required adjustment. Fifteen percent of participants said their company adjusts only 1-1.9% of their invoices, 11% said their company adjusts only 2-2.9% of invoices and 13% said their company adjusts only 3-3.9% of their invoices.

Participants in the follow-up survey were also asked how many invoices their company issues annually. The most popular answer was "10,001-25,000," which garnered 17% of all responses, followed by "5,001-10,000" and "25,001-50,000" which received 12% and 11% respectively. There was little deviance among different classes of invoices; whether a respondent's company issued close to a thousand invoices a year or close to a million, the better part of them noted that less than 1% of their invoices required adjustment. Still, for larger companies that invoice more than 100,000, 500,000 or even 1 million invoices a year, having to adjust even less than 1% of them could still be a sizeable problem that impedes the payment process.

Of the different invoice classes, respondents who issued between 500,001 and 1 million per year had the highest percentage of "less than 1%," with nearly half (46%) answering this way.

Jacob Barron, NACM staff writer