Item: Tipalti
Rating: 10
Author: Lisa Vokes-Pierre

Overall Satisfaction with Tipalti

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use Tipalti in supporting our end-to-end accounts payable process. Prior to implementation, we would receive an invoice and make payments across multiple platforms, e.g. via local banking solution or by instruction via email to our bank. Approvals were obtained via email and tracked via Airtable to at least have some transparency. Scope of Tipalti now is to scan all invoices that come through our shared mailbox and suggest coding as well as approvers. Approval process is seamless and the beauty is the ability to make the payment - OR- mark the payment as paid manually when it makes more sense to pay locally.

Pros and Cons

Pros

Flexibility in trying to solve the business problem that may be specific to our location or type of business
Pretty quick support
Ambitions to improve the solution - there is a roadmap

Cons

Reporting capabilities are quite limited and certainly not configurable
Connections between screens could be improved - improvements to UI would be beneficial
Approval via SMS

Return on Investment

Time saved across all aspect of our operation - routing, approver and payer
Increased transparency and comfort that nothing has fallen through the cracks
Improved connection to ERP system - some aspects are not automatable (QBO with multiple entities)...but certainly has improved time taken by accountants and hence reduced cost (not quantified)

Usability

Tipalti solves most of our problems. There are improvements that can be made and limitations that would be great to overcome, but in all cases, we´ve been able to establish workarounds.

Alternatives Considered

Pleo, SAP Concur, Yokoy, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, Spendesk and BILL

Tipalti was in fact the only solution that met all our critical requirements (e2e) and supported ISK payments. Credit cards is not an available functionality outside the US, but wasn´t a critical feature for us.

Key Insights

Do you think Tipalti delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Tipalti's feature set?

Yes

Did Tipalti live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Tipalti go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy Tipalti again?

Yes

Other Software Used

LiveFlow

Likelihood to Recommend

Tipalti has suited our operation - a small venture capital firm with multiple entities and multiple currencies. It specifically supports ISK, which is not an obvious product in the market.
A limitation for our business is the lack of ability to support an individual. Tipalti has, however, been very flexible in supporting workarounds that solve the business problem, albeit not optimally.

Tipalti Feature Ratings

Using Tipalti

Users and Roles

8 - COO, Real Estate, Executive Assistant, Book-keepers

Support Headcount Required

1 - Anyone with some basic finance knowledge and knowledge of system configuration. Does not require IT specific resources.

Business Processes Supported

End-to-end invoice to payment process
Approval process
Financial reporting
Ease of book-keeping
Connectivity with ERP solution

Innovative Uses

Ability to support a family office and HNW individual

Future Planned Uses

Cashflow modelling
Treasury

Likelihood to Renew

Solid system performance. Suits our needs and solution provider very inclined to accept feedback and involve users in developing the solution to serve both the provider and the ultimate user. Tipalti has streamlined our process that was previously very manual and prone to error. Now there is transparency of information and role.

Evaluating Tipalti and Competitors

Products Replaced

No - Our process was very manual

Key Differentiators

Cloud Solutions
Integration with Other Systems
Ease of Use
Other

Single most important factor was the ability to support the Icelandic market and a family office concept. Thankfully Tipalti provided the majority of features we were looking for in comparison with other solutions we evaluated at the time. Integration with our ERP system (QBO and Business Central) was also fundamental and would have been a deal-breaker if not available.

Evaluation Lessons Learned

No change per se.

Tipalti Implementation

Implementation Rating

The salesperson involved was involved in implementation which I found very helpful.

Implementation Details / Implementation Partner

Implemented in-house

Implementation Phases

Change Management Lessons

Change management was minimal

Implementation Issues

None

Tipalti Support

Support Rating

In majority of cases, the response from the Level 1 support team is quick. A customer service rep is available for escalation as required and a monthly meeting is held with the rep to discuss any issues. There are certainly opportunities for some requests that are posted to support to be configurable by the user in the application (eg. expense accounts).

Tipalti Customer Support Pros and Cons

Pros	Cons
Quick Resolution Good followup Knowledgeable team Problems get solved Kept well informed No escalation required Immediate help available Support understands my problem Support cares about my success Quick Initial Response	None

Premium Support

No - not required since I get premium support already. I´m not aware that there is a premium support feature available and what that service would entail beyond what service I already receive. I have a customer representative assigned to my company. I have a monthly meeting with the representative and can escalate to the representative on an ad hoc basis.

Bug Resolution

Exceptional Examples of Tipalti Support

I find the the outreach for feedback exemplary. Tipalti engages with users that provide feedback with a platform to be engaged with the product designers. Was for example invited to a workshop in Amsterdam to review possible improvements to the tool. The CEO has reached out directly to engage with me on a new product feature that Tipalti was working on.