Wahlburgers Cuts AP Admin Time from 15 Hours to Just 4
For over a decade, Wahlburgers has built a reputation as a leading dining restaurant chain known for its premium burgers and welcoming atmosphere. With over 90 locations, this global brand expanded its worldwide footprint into Australia in February 2022, focusing on quality food and customer experience.
As a prominent player in the hospitality industry, Wahlburgers faces numerous challenges and opportunities in meeting customer demands and managing supply chain logistics. Among these challenges were long accounts payable (AP) processing times and a lack of AP resources to maintain operational efficiency. To address these issues, the company turned to Lightyear’s AP automation solution, which integrates seamlessly with MYOB Acumatica and reduces administrative overhead.
The Hidden Costs of Wrong AP Software
Nicole Newham, the Finance Manager at Wahlburgers, shared that prior to implementing Lightyear, the finance team in Australia was quite small.
''Last year, we had just one additional person handling AP, and for about two months, it was just me managing everything by myself."
When Nicole initially joined the Wahlburgers' team, she found their AP solution to be quite limited in its capabilities. Being accustomed to more automated approaches to AP, she quickly realised that this AP provider was not providing the efficiency they needed.
"I found Traild to be very limited in the rules you could set up and the way you could edit them. Its learning process was also essentially impossible. Once it learned something, it just ran with it."
Due to a lack of resources, they couldn't perform statement reconciliation regularly. Instead, it became a reactionary process.
''We had to manually go through and figure out which invoices were missing. We simply didn’t have the resources available to keep up. Plus, the so-called statement reconciliation functionality in Traild doesn’t pull line items or give you the total. It just allows you to manually select invoices under a supplier and link them to a statement. It's basically unusable."
These challenges prompted her to seek a more advanced solution to streamline their AP processes.
''I believe it’s the most comprehensive AP software on the market, with its ability to extract line item data instantly, automatically reconcile statements, and integrate seamlessly with MYOB Acumatica."
Wahlburgers has now implemented Lightyear across multiple restaurants, United Cinema locations, and Shore Beach Club in Australia.
Escaping the Accounts Payable Time Trap
Nicole emphasised that automatic statement reconciliation was one of the major factors that led Wahlburgers to move to Lightyear.
"The fact that you can use this feature and send emails directly from the system to the supplier with a list of all the missing invoices is incredible. The time saved is just amazing."
With Wahlburgers' previous system, every invoice required manual edits for GST, line item mapping, and classification.
''We spent about 50-60 seconds per invoice just validating the data, and with 250-300 invoices per week, it added up to 15-20 hours a week."
Since implementing Lightyear, she added, "We now spend just about 10 seconds per invoice. The custom mapping created by Lightyear’s team has greatly reduced validation time. Now, instead of focusing on data entry, we can spend time adding value, such as checking contracted pricing and quotes."
With ongoing updates to Lightyear, Smart Extract+ now delivers faster and more accurate data extraction without the need for mapping.
It removes the need for one full headcount. Previously, we needed a full person dedicated to managing just the AP .
Taking Control with Smarter AP Access
Nicole highlighted that a key difference between Lightyear and other AP systems is the ability to set keyword rules in Lightyear.
‘'You can determine how the system picks up and identifies things like branch, GL codes and approvals, which you can’t do in Traild. Being able to instantly change a rule and apply it to everything in the approval queue gives you massive control." explains Nicole.
The line item extraction in Lightyear has made a huge difference to their financial visibility. Nicole further added that being able to quickly find information, such as the last supplier for cleaning services or the most recent annual maintenance for fire protection, makes a significant difference to the operations team.
'''In industries like hospitality or cinemas, where invoices have large volumes of transactions, searching and accessing that information is important. The head office team really likes that they can now search through invoices, whereas in Traild, they could never do that. Lightyear is giving people more autonomy over their GL codes and departments."
15-Hour AP Process Now Done in Just 4
The overall AP processing time for the Wahlburgers finance team has been drastically reduced.
‘'We used to spend around 15 hours a week on AP processing. Now, with Lightyear, it takes just 4 hours, saving us over 10 hours every week." says Nicole.
Decreased processing time meant Wahlburgers didn’t need additional hires to manage their AP tasks, and existing team members could focus on other value-added tasks.
"It removes the need for 1 full headcount. Previously, we needed a full person dedicated to managing just the AP. Now, that same person handles AP, payroll, month-end tasks, and statement reconciliations without being overloaded or facing unrealistic expectations."
When asked what advice Nicole would give someone looking at Lightyear for AP automation, she said: ''Just go for it. It's a very well-thought-out software that is very user-friendly and intuitive to use. It's a huge time saver for everyone involved."
| Feature/Aspect | Wahlburgers' previous AP provider |  |
| Automation & Efficiency | “Very limited” in setting up and editing rules. | “The most comprehensive AP software,” instantly extracts line item data. |
| Rules & Customisation | “Once it learned something, it just ran with it” with no easy way to modify. | “Instantly change a rule and apply it to everything in the approval queue.” |
| Statement Reconciliation | “Basically unusable” | Fully automated, even when requesting missing invoices from suppliers. |
| Invoice Processing Time | “50-60 seconds per invoice” | “Now spend just about 10 seconds per invoice.” |
| Processing Time Per Week | “15 hours a week on AP processing.” | “Now... just 4 hours, saving over 10 hours every week.” |
| Staffing Impact | Needed a “full person dedicated” to AP. | “Now, that same person handles AP, payroll, month-end tasks, and reconciliations.” |
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