Accounts receivable (AR) is responsible for turning sales into cash. Finance oversees cash flow. On the surface, this makes AR a finance function. But dig deeper, and a critical gap emerges: customer relationships. Finance may be well-versed in the numbers, but they often lack the context of a customer’s overall experience—and that’s where the problems begin.
Instead, AR should also be a revenue-driven function, not just a cash flow driven function. Here’s our case as to why.
The traditional setup is broken
In many corporate structures, AR is relegated to a transactional role within the finance department—focused solely on chasing payments, tracking invoices, etc. The problem is, effective AR is just as much about people as it is dollars and cents.
Finance teams are experts at the mechanics of cash management: who owes what, when it’s due, and how it impacts cash flow. What they often lack, though, is the full story behind payment issues.
When disputes inevitably pop up, like a…
- Delivery hiccup (“Your shipment arrived damaged”),
- Pricing mismatch (“This doesn’t match the quote from Sales”),
- Grace period request (“Payroll is delayed—can we push the deadline?”),
- Lost invoice (“Our AP contact is out on leave”)
… AR teams lack the context required to resolve them effectively. This is a big reason why 8 out of 10 executives have AR disputes that stem from communication gaps.
This isn’t a failure of finance—it's a failure of alignment.
The customer experience problem
Saying AR is about “collecting payments” is like saying customer support is about answering calls. It’s an important part of the job, to be sure, but it’s one part. Just as crucial (if not more so) is building strong rapport with key suppliers. That’s what lays the foundation for on-time payments in the long run.
Customers don’t see businesses as a collection of different departments. To them, it’s all one entity—and they experience it as such. When their payment concerns bounce around departments, the experience feels clunky and impersonal. And when AR is siloed from revenue teams, that’s often exactly what happens. This isn’t a one-off issue, either—72% of C-suites have concerns that their AR departments aren’t sufficiently customer-oriented.
Ultimately, customers don’t want to explain their service issues in detail or be overwhelmed by complex billing statements. They just want to be heard and have their issue resolved.
Navigating these nuances is where your revenue teams shine. They’re the ones that own the customer relationships that are so vital for long-run AR health.
The case for treating AR as a revenue function
The more you think about it, the clearer it becomes: AR should be tied at the hip with revenue. They can deliver a far more seamless and customer-centric process by leaning on those within your organization that know your customers best.
Here’s a typical scenario to illustrate why this shift makes sense: a customer delays payment because of an incomplete delivery or a pricing discrepancy. A finance team member approaches the situation with only the basics in hand—an invoice number, a due date, and the amount owed. Lacking any background knowledge about the customer relationship, they do their best to address the issue, but quickly hit a wall. After a few back-and-forth emails or calls, they punt the issue to the revenue team.
This disconnect disappears once AR operates as a shared function between finance and revenue. The same team that negotiated the deal or supported the customer throughout their journey handles the payment concern. They already know the context—whether it’s an unresolved issue or a miscommunication—and can help address it on the spot. You gain faster resolutions, fewer escalations, and a better customer experience all around by working as a cohesive team.
Proven benefits of revenue-powered AR
To sum up, here’s why revenue-powered AR is the ideal setup:
- Context is king: Involving revenue teams gives everyone a 360-degree view of the customer journey. AR teams are more likely to know why a payment is delayed (they just implemented a new ERP) while the revenue teams know the history of the relationship with that customer (they’ve been an incredible customer for five years).
- Proactive problem-solving: Because revenue teams maintain frequent contact with customers, they can spot and address potential payment problems before they escalate into full-blown disputes.
- Dramatically reduced DSO: Businesses often see a marked drop in DSO once they link AR to revenue. Why? Revenue teams’ familiarity with customer behavior and their natural incentives to resolve payment delays lead to faster collections.
- Better control over credit limits: Revenue teams, working hand-in-hand with finance, bring an on-the-ground perspective to credit management. They can spot subtle shifts in a customer’s payment behavior—delayed payments, increasing invoice disputes—that might signal financial distress. Flagging these issues as soon as they pop up allows you to proactively adjust credit terms that mitigate risk without damaging the relationship.
Modernizing AR with AI integration
Coordinating AR with revenue is no small undertaking. There are permissions to update, processes to tweak, and spreadsheets to migrate. Fortunately, you don’t need your teams to spend weeks bogged down in the minutiae of this transition. Much of the heavy lifting can be handled by AI agents.
These agents can automate all sorts of tasks—even ones that fall outside of rigid rules. But more importantly, they can build crucial connective tissue between your revenue and finance teams.
Here’s how AI helps bring AR into the revenue fold:
- System integrations, simplified: AI connects your CRM, ERP, point-of-sale, and banking data into a single, unified view, giving revenue teams instant access to the customer context they need for effective collections.
- Real-time insights: AI doesn’t just collect data—it interprets it. It flags potential issues, like changes in payment behavior or recurring disputes, and sends them to revenue teams for proactive intervention.
- Automated cash application: Matching payments to invoices manually is a labor-intensive task that’s prone to errors. AI automates this process, ensuring payments are applied accurately and quickly.
- Frictionless customer experience: AI agents streamline customer interactions, handling routine inquiries and sending personalized reminders that improve the overall customer experience.
- Unified teams, unified data: AI keeps revenue and finance teams operating from the same playbook. It eliminates the miscommunications and bottlenecks that often arise in siloed systems by updating credit statuses, account histories, and payment terms in real time.
A better path forward
We get it—aligning AR with the revenue function seems like a huge undertaking. There are dozens of competing priorities vying for your attention. But keep the big picture in mind: in the long run, the benefits of making this shift far outweigh the effort it takes. Plus, with the right tools like AI agents, it’s easier to pull off than you might think.
At Stuut, we’re helping businesses like yours take this next step. Our solutions are designed to simplify AR management, improve collaboration between teams, and deliver better outcomes for everyone involved.
Let’s build a smarter, more customer-centric AR process together. Get in touch with us to learn more.