What is the Top AR Software for Business Services Firms?

Complex billing requirements. Delayed payments. Endless follow-ups.

Business services firms and their financial teams deal with it all, and too many still deal with it all manually. The right accounts receivable (AR) software can help significantly, accelerating digital payment volume, slashing payment processing costs, and doubling – even tripling – performance metrics. As a result, more finance leaders at business services firms are considering what the top AR software can do for their operation.

But what makes AR software the best? The following AR automation software features and capabilities are instrumental for business services firms.

Features to Look For: Top AR Software for Business Services Firms

• AR automation that eliminates repetitive administrative tasks across the entire order-to-cash cycle, freeing up teams to address more strategic work and strengthen customer relationships with more time for personal attention.
• AI tools that streamline cash application, simplify exception handling, and empower teams with data-driven insights for payment predictions and smart cash flow forecasting.
• Consider the flexibility needed to accept a variety of payment methods through all channels, ease of use in customizing the software to your financial process, and extensive integration for smooth data flow between your AR platform and your ERPs, banks, and other financial systems.
• A partner who will deliver superior support and collaboration, helping spot new opportunities for revenue growth and tackle adjacent challenges – ones outside the typical scope of the software features.

See why Billtrust is ranked one of the best AR software automation software for business services. 

Why do business services firms struggle with cash flow?

The industry is notorious for complex and inconsistent revenue and payment cycles – issues that only intensify when manual processes dominate departmental work. In one study, nearly 60% of business services firms said that more than 50% of their clients still pay by check – a payment method fraught with handwork. Roughly 75% still send invoices through the mail, 71% spend hours chasing down payments, and only 30% send regular reminders. Perhaps most concerning is that over 40% don’t have clear financial goals or aren’t sure if they do.

Unlike product-based businesses with fixed pricing and straightforward billing, service firms run on time, milestones, and projects. Every client has different rates, schedules, and contract terms, and payments usually depend on long approval chains. Any change to the project scope (which often happens) creates a ripple effect of revised invoices and delayed payments.

When handled with manual spreadsheets, this complexity easily turns into chaos: errors multiply, cash flow stalls, bad debt climbs, and financial forecasting becomes glorified guesswork.

Why is automation a must-have in AR software for business services firms?

Research from Vanson Bourne finds that more than half of business services firms said AR automation has significantly sped up payments – cutting Days Sales Outstanding (DSO) by an average of 14 days. Nearly 90% are seeing clear value from their automated AR software, and 70% say it’s delivered the ROI they expected.

For business services firms, implementing AR software can accelerate the speed of their invoice payments by two weeks.

The quickest wins come from streamlining repetitive work like generating and delivering invoices, accepting payments across channels, sending payment reminders, and ensuring invoices and credit card payment processing meet regulatory standards for compliance.

What processes should business services firms automate with AR software?

While AR software providers, like Billtrust, focus on end-to-end automation in one platform, here’s a look at just a few of the processes business services companies should automate.

Invoice automation gets invoices out the door faster – formatted correctly, routed through the right channel, and delivered with full compliance. For Ernst & Young, one of the world’s most recognized professional services organizations sending 125B invoices per year, Billtrust’s solution helped consolidate global data, support multiple delivery paths, and ensure electronic invoicing compliance across dozens of countries. Check out their story here.

A digital lockbox instantly captures, centralizes, and cleans remittance data received across different payment channels, prepping it for faster and more accurate matching. This is game-changing in situations like virtual card payments sent via email, significantly saving time, and closing risky compliance gaps. Explore how Billtrust’s Digital Lockbox automates the capture and processing of virtual card payments.

Cash application automation speeds up the process of matching payments to open invoices, automatically applying clean, structured payment data and freeing teams from manual reconciliation. AI-driven cash application results in the greatest impact with machine learning’s ability to handle unstructured data, learn from every match, and adapt over time. This is how one of Billtrust’s professional services clients, Cintas, more than doubled payment processing speed while saving $1M a year. Read their story here.

Collections automation helps teams focus on the right delinquent accounts at the right time, sending personalized messages through the right channel. This can double efficiency while reducing DSO by nearly 50% — like it did for one of our professional services clients, Peak Industrial. Watch the video.

AI is reshaping the way finance teams work. Why is it essential in AR software for business services firms?

A new study from Wakefield Research proves that AI has matured into a critical capability in AR.

• 99% of finance organizations currently using AI have successfully reduced their average DSO, with 75% reporting a reduction of six days or more.
• 82% scaled operations without adding staff.
• 43% saw improved cash flow predictability and stability.
• 90% believe their AR process will struggle to scale without AI.

Leveraging all types of AI across the order-to-cash cycle delivers the highest levels of automation, insight, and accuracy that will transform business.

Here are two key opportunities for business services firms.

AI Capabilities Business Services Firms Should Look For

1. Machine learning-powered Cash Application 

AI-powered cash application leverages ML and confidence-based matching to ensure industry-leading, straight-through processing with fewer exceptions and manual rework.

Here’s how it works:

• Step 1: Read and adapt. AI automatically processes every new payment, no matter how it’s formatted. It can handle unstructured data, adapt to new invoice layouts, and even piece together details split across multiple files or emails.
• Step 2: Score and decide. For every potential payment match, AI assigns a confidence score – a representation of how sure it is that a payment belongs to a specific invoice. You set the threshold. Anything above it gets applied automatically, and anything below gets routed to your team for review. This is how you reduce manual work without losing control.
• Step 3: Learn and improve. Over time, AI learns from every match and every human validation, continuously improving its accuracy. Unlike rigid, rules-based systems, it adapts as your data, customers, and payment behaviors evolve. 
  

2. Generative AI + Agentic AI 

Generative AI (GenAI) was groundbreaking when it hit the scene. It allows teams to easily ask questions about massive amounts of AR data and get trusted answers. The next evolution is Agentic AI. It not only leverages GenAI insights but uses them to make recommendations for performance improvement. Once approved, it can act on those recommendations, taking on more of the work.

Here’s how business services firms can use GenAI and Agentic AI to their advantage.

• Spot risks early. AI can monitor buyer behavior, flag potential payment risks, and benchmark performance against the market in real-time.
• Find new savings. AI can identify ways to cut costs – or even earn more money – by shifting buyers to lower-cost payment methods, reallocating credit, or adjusting terms.
• Ask and know instantly. Get real-time answers to complex AR questions in plain language – like ChatGPT, built for AR. The best AI platforms are trained on vast, anonymized transactional data, delivering insights and recommendations rooted in real performance patterns. For instance, Billtrust’s AI engine is trained on anonymized data from over $1T in invoice transactions annually. Discover why the smartest AI models make the smartest AR automation for business services.
• Responsive credit management. AI can track credit scores and payment behaviors, adjusting limits and extending credit to more reliable buyers automatically.
• Personalize payment policies. AI can adjust payment terms and acceptance policies based on buyer risk trends helping drive faster payments and lower processing costs. This explains why Billtrust clients see savings of up to 30%.
• Forecast payments. AI can predict when your customers are likely to pay – crucial intel for planning cash flow and allocating capital resources effectively.
• Increase collections and recovery rates. Identify high-risk buyers, segmenting debtors into groups for streamlined multi-channel outreach. Generate personalized collection messages at scale for higher engagement that reduces bad debt.

It’s no wonder 71% of organizations plan to increase AI investment in AR over the next year!

Why is flexibility, ease of use, and integration critical for AR software?

The best AR software doesn’t force teams to adapt to rigid rules but instead has customizable workflows. The platform will also have integrations that connect seamlessly with existing ERP and financial systems, keeping accurate data flows between invoicing, payments, and collections activities.

When AR software plays nicely with the rest of the finance department’s tech stack, teams get full visibility across systems without endless file uploads, data re-entry and reconciliation. Less time is spent managing data, and more time is dedicated to driving outcomes.

This flexibility and integration are also the foundation for building AI into your AR process. Cintas, for example, had 16 people working across 5 different platforms. Only 30% of their payments posted automatically. Billtrust helped them consolidate these systems so everything would live in one place – from check images and remittance details to payment notes and processing issues. What used to require separate emails and conversations is now a unified database of instantly accessible information, enabling visibility at every stage of the payment process. Today, only two people are needed to handle payment processing, and the organization has a 90% auto-posting rate.

Flexibility, ease of use, and integration are essential. You need AR software that fits your business and can seamlessly move with it.

Why should I look beyond AR software? Why does a trusted partner matter?

When business services companies invest, they’re not just buying AR software. They’re choosing a provider whose approach, corporate values, and people will shape how your AR evolves. That “someone” should be able to guide innovation, adapt when priorities shift, and show up when the unexpected happens. It’s the difference between a vendor that just installs technology and a true partner that helps you build momentum.

In Wakefield’s study that difference came through loud and clear. Trust ranked among the top decision drivers in choosing an AR provider, right alongside ROI and innovation. Hear Billtrust’s clients explain why Billtrust is a partner they can trust.

Ready to see what Billtrust can do for your business services firm? Talk with one of our experts today.