By Artem Korsakov ·
Accounts receivable control is useful when a manager sees, next to the amount owed, the reason for the delay, the person responsible and the next action. In B2B, the same overdue amount can mean different situations: the client disputes the volume, their accounts department is waiting for a document, the payment has not yet been allocated, or a manager accepted a promise without a specific date. AI helps gather these explanations from correspondence. The outstanding balance, the due date and the fact of payment must rely on verified accounting data.
In short: combine the accounting balance, documents and contact history in one card. Give AI the parsing of emails and draft replies. Give rules the calculation of deadlines and task control. Leave confirmation of disputed facts and sending of messages to an employee.
Why the overdue amount does not explain the problem
Imagine a contractor that services equipment at several plants. The report shows three clients with the same debt. The first has not received the completion certificate, the second accepted the work and promised to pay on Friday, the third considers part of the services unapproved. The same reminder to all three will create unnecessary negotiations and will not remove the causes of the delay.
Training example: three clients with the same debt and different reasons for the delay. The amount in the report is identical, but the next action is different for each client.
That is why the card needs two independent groups of information. The accounting part contains the legal entity, the contract, the settlement document, the currency, the balance and the due date. The operational part contains the reason, the supporting email, the promised date, the person responsible and the next step. A manager can edit the explanation but must not quietly change the accounting debt. If the information is contradictory, the card is sent for reconciliation.
What to keep in 1C and the CRM
The description of the treasury module in 1C:ERP (1C is a widely used Russian business accounting platform) provides for controlling settlements by different settlement objects, including documents. Before development, it is worth checking what level of detail already exists in the specific database. The description applies to 1C:ERP. Capabilities may differ in other 1C products.
A CRM is convenient for contacts, tasks and responsible managers. If the whole process fits into existing cards and reports, a separate application may not be needed. A small portal is useful when a manager constantly has to reconcile an accounting export, several CRMs and email. The first version can be built on an agreed scheduled export. The interface must show when it was last updated.
At the same time, a contract with a group of companies does not equal a single payer. Balances of different legal entities, currencies and contracts must not be collapsed just because the clients share a brand. The grounds for offsets or adjustments are confirmed by the accounts department, and the service shows the already agreed result.
How to build a receivables register
A receivables register should let you go from the total amount to a specific obligation. For each row, useful fields are the identifier in the source database, the original amount, offset payments and adjustments, the balance, the payment due date, a dispute flag and the next contact. If the contract has several stages, rows are created per stage. One row for the whole contract would hide which stage is unpaid.
The document date, the service performance date and the start date of the payment term may differ. The due date cannot be confidently calculated from the phrase “they usually pay within a month”. The basis for the date is recorded by an authorised employee. If the export does not contain it, the row gets the flag “due date needs clarification”. Overdue status is not calculated by guesswork.
To start, two views are enough: a task queue for the manager and a list of exceptions for the accounts department. An ageing colour chart is useful only when you can open a record from it and understand what to do today.
How AI helps with payment control
AI for payment control receives the selected correspondence on a specific contract. The output should include the message type, the presumed reason for the delay, the amount mentioned, the promised date, the documents mentioned and links to the emails. For each extracted fact, the original wording is kept. The phrase “we'll try to settle it next week” must not be turned into a confirmed commitment for Monday.
The manager reviews the draft, clarifies the date and confirms the record. Then an ordinary rule creates a task: check receipt after the promised date, send the agreed document or escalate the dispute to a manager. AI can also prepare a calm reminder with the correct document number. In the first launch, sending remains manual.
Training example: AI parses a client's email about a delayed payment. A vague promise stays vague until the manager clarifies the date. The task is created by a rule.
The technical ability to extract information from documents is shown, for example, in the AI Builder documentation: the service returns fields, recognised text and source pages. The link illustrates how processing works and is not a recommendation of a specific platform for your company. For the company's documents, language, formats, processing conditions and availability of the chosen service are checked separately.
Example: debt, promise and receipt are counted separately
All amounts in this example are illustrative, in Russian roubles (RUB). For an accepted service, RUB 300,000 has been recorded; confirmed and allocated payments amount to RUB 120,000. The balance is RUB 180,000. The client disputes RUB 30,000 of this balance and promises to transfer RUB 100,000 in three days. The balance is still RUB 180,000. A promise does not reduce the debt, and the disputed amount is part of the balance, not added on top.
The card can show RUB 150,000 with no registered dispute and RUB 30,000 under dispute. Three days later, the bank confirms receipt of RUB 80,000, and the accounts department allocates it to this obligation. The new balance is RUB 100,000. If the promise related specifically to this payment, its unfulfilled part is RUB 20,000. This is information for the conversation with the client; it does not create a new debt.
If the purpose of a receipt is unclear, the service shows it as requiring allocation. It does not close the first matching invoice based on a similar amount. Otherwise the manager will stop working on the real debt and start bothering another client.
Illustrative calculation (RUB): accrual, payments, dispute, promise and receipt. The disputed RUB 30,000 is included in the balance. The unfulfilled part of the promise, RUB 20,000, is needed for the conversation with the client and is not added to the debt.
How to set priorities without pressuring clients
Receivables automation takes into account the size and age of the debt, but that is not enough. The queue includes a broken promise, a missing document, a dispute without an owner and the date of the next contact. Priority is assigned by clear rules that a manager can explain. A hidden AI “unreliability” score does not replace verified grounds.
The Dynamics 365 documentation on collections describes action strategies, a preliminary simulation and intervals between contacts. For your own small service, this principle is useful: first see which actions would result, then allow them to run. You do not need to switch to Dynamics for this.
A shared contact log prevents a situation where the accountant writes in the morning, a manager calls in the afternoon and an automatic email arrives in the evening. During an agreed dispute review, regular reminders can be paused. A pause must have a reason, a review date and an owner; otherwise it becomes a way to hide the problem.
Where the assistant's capabilities end
The assistant does not establish the legal validity of a debt, does not calculate contractual penalties by guesswork and does not negotiate on behalf of the company. If a proposal to change terms arrives, the employee passes it through the accepted approval procedure. Documents and messages are available only to those who work with the relevant clients.
It is especially important not to mix email history with current accounting. An old message saying “everything is paid” does not confirm today's balance. External text is material for extracting information. It does not become a command to transfer money, change bank details or delete records. Changes to financial fields go through the prescribed check in the source system.
What first scope is really reasonable
For the first launch, choose one legal entity, one type of contract and a group of managers. Include balances from the accounting system, manual confirmation of delay reasons, tasks and parsing of several types of emails. First test on some settled obligations: the service must correctly link payments, not report false overdue amounts and not create a duplicate contact.
Measure the share of cards with a confirmed reason, the time to prepare for a call, the number of missed promises and incorrect reminders. A reduction in total receivables cannot be attributed entirely to the service: it is affected by sales, payment terms, seasonality and client behaviour. The practical value of the first version is a manageable action queue and a reliable history.
If you want to test this scenario for your company, prepare an anonymised receivables export and several email threads with different reasons for delay. trike_dev can help design the register, task rules and an assistant for parsing correspondence tailored to your process.
Related reading: A contractor's cash gap: how to link work, completion certificates and payments; Freight document control: completeness, signatures and payment (Russian).
Частые вопросы ### Can AI send reminders to debtors on its own?
Technically, sending can be automated, but first you need to verify recipients, balance accuracy, grounds for contact and intervals between messages. For the first version, drafts confirmed by a manager are more sensible. Disputed cases need a separate route.
Do we need to replace our accounting system?
Usually, an agreed export or a supported exchange is enough for this scenario. Financial data stays in the accounting system, and the additional product helps work with the reasons for delays and the actions. The connection method depends on the configuration and access rights.