Why Companies Lose Money on Invoices (and How to Stop It)
In 2019, Lithuanian Evaldas Rimasauskas was sentenced to five years in prison for a scam in which he tricked Google and Facebook out of more than $120 million. His method? Fake invoices for legitimately delivered goods — except the money went to his own accounts instead of the real supplier’s.
This isn’t a problem limited to tech giants.
A company orders 2,000 components. The delivery arrives with 1,200. The invoice? For the full 2,000.
This scenario can be prevented, yet most companies still handle it manually. Someone has to dig up the purchase order, find the delivery note, and compare it to the invoice. Three documents, five minutes of work, and a high chance of error.
What 3-Way Matching Means in Practice
3-way matching is a process that automatically compares three documents:
Purchase order – what the company ordered and at what price
Delivery note – what physically arrived in the warehouse
Invoice – what the supplier is billing
When all three match in quantity, price, and items, the invoice can be approved. If not, the system flags it, and someone has to find out why.
It’s not revolutionary technology — it’s simply the automation of what every person approving invoices should be doing. But in most cases, they don’t do it consistently.
Where the Money Gets Lost
According to studies, roughly 3–5% of B2B invoices deviate in some way from the purchase order. The most common cases are:
Price differences – The company agreed on a discount, but the invoice uses the old price. Or the supplier simply charges more than agreed.
Quantity differences – Fewer items arrived than are listed on the invoice. Someone in the warehouse miscounted, or the supplier hoped no one would notice.
Duplicate invoices – The same invoice arrives by email and by post. Or the supplier sends it twice “just to be sure.” Result: double payment.
Invoices for cancelled orders – The order was cancelled, but the invoice still came through.
For 500 invoices per month with an average value of €5,000, that means a potential loss of €75,000–€125,000 per year. Not every discrepancy is fraud — but every discrepancy costs money.
How It Works in a System
Modern procurement systems have 3-way matching built in. The process works like this:
The purchasing department creates a purchase order — the system records the items, quantities, and prices.
The warehouse receives the goods and logs the delivery note — what actually arrived.
The accountant uploads the invoice into the system (as a scan or PDF).
The system automatically compares all three documents.
If everything matches, the invoice goes for approval. If not, the system highlights the specific difference:
“Invoiced 2,000 pcs, delivered 1,850 pcs”
“Invoiced price €44.50, ordered price €42.00”
“Item XY123 not found in purchase order”
Someone in the company must then explain the difference and confirm whether the invoice is valid or not.
Why It’s Rarely Done in Practice
The main reason is simple: manually, it’s a pain.
The accounting team gets the invoice. They have to find the purchase order (maybe in another system, maybe in an email). They have to find the delivery note (often on paper, somewhere in the warehouse). They have to compare everything line by line.
With 50 invoices per month, that’s manageable. With 200+, it becomes days of work. So it’s done only randomly — or not at all.
The result: invoices get approved simply because “it looks fine.” That’s not control — that’s gambling.
What It Actually Solves
The main benefit isn’t just catching errors or fraud. It’s using time effectively.
Instead of copying numbers from PDFs into Excel and comparing them manually, the accounting department can focus on real issues: why a supplier keeps under-delivering, why prices fluctuate, how to optimize orders.
And for companies where approval takes weeks, automatic matching means invoices that are correct pass through the system in hours, not days.
How It Works in ProcureSwift
We built our procurement application on exactly this principle — automatic 3-way matching running in the background without burdening the accounting department.
The system works simply: if the documents match, the invoice goes for approval. If not, the system clearly shows where the problem is — whether it’s a difference in quantity, price, or an item that doesn’t belong there. Then all that’s left is to find out why and decide whether to approve or reject the invoice.
The key is that all three documents are digital and stored in one place. No Excel sheets, no email threads, no papers in drawers.
Conclusion
3-way matching is a basic practice every company should follow. It’s not about distrusting suppliers — it’s about controlling your own money.
Companies without automatic matching lose both time and money: time on manual checks that are often skipped anyway, and money on discrepancies that go unnoticed.
ProcureSwift automates this entire process to run seamlessly in the background. No extra training, no complex setup — just precise verification of every invoice before it’s paid.