ERP investments are often judged by whether finance, procurement, operations, and reporting can run on a common platform. A new Priority Commerce report argues that many organizations still lose part of that value at the accounts payable (AP) layer.
Priority Commerce’s 2026 ERP Report: Closing the ERP Value Gap surveyed 150 US-based ERP end users responsible for AP processes at organizations with at least 200 employees. Its core finding is that ERP systems may sit at the center of the finance function, but payment workflows still often run around them.
Only 57% of respondents said their AP workflows are fully integrated into their ERP systems. That leaves 43% still relying on at least some AP processes outside the ERP environment.
That data is not only about automation as it points to a broader ERP value gap. If invoice, payment, vendor, reconciliation, and approval activity is fragmented across systems or manual workarounds, the ERP can struggle to deliver the visibility, scalability, and process control customers expect from the platform.
AP automation is already present in many organizations. The problem is that partial automation still leaves too much operational friction outside the ERP experience.
AP Is Still Escaping the ERP
Priority Commerce’s report shows a clear divide between organizations that have pulled AP fully into ERP workflows and those still managing pieces of the process elsewhere.
Organizations with fully integrated AP workflows were twice as likely as those managing some AP processes outside the ERP system to say their AP processes strongly support scalability, at 71% versus 35%. They were also far less likely to report gaps in payment tracking, process monitoring, and access to current AP information, at 36% versus 90%.
That distinction shows AP is no longer a narrow back-office workflow. Payment status, vendor terms, cash timing, approval bottlenecks, invoice accuracy, and reconciliation all affect how finance leaders manage working capital and operating visibility.
The report found that among organizations without fully integrated AP workflows, 100% agreed they would get more value from their ERP if AP processes were more fully integrated. The expected benefits were led by better data for financial planning and decision-making at 45%, improved visibility into payment status and financial activity at 42%, and faster processing with fewer delays at 37%.
That puts AP integration in a different category. It is not just a productivity improvement for finance teams. It is a test of whether ERP providers can extend platform value into the payment moments where users still feel friction.
Integration Helps; It Doesn’t End the Work
The report is careful not to present integration as a cure-all. Across integration levels, 92% of respondents reported at least one challenge in their current AP environment. The top pain points were manual data entry or repetitive tasks at 40% and lack of integration between payment systems at 34%.
Manual work also remains common. More than four in five ERP users surveyed, 81%, said they spend at least three hours per week on manual payment processes or workarounds. Of all respondents, 36% spend six or more hours per week.
An interesting argument emerges here. Full AP integration correlates with stronger visibility and scalability, but it does not automatically make the AP function easier to evolve.
Nearly all respondents, 92%, had made updates to AP processes in the previous year. More than four in five, 82%, reported at least some difficulty updating or improving AP processes, including 30% who described those efforts as moderately or very difficult.
The top barriers were not surprising: budget constraints, limited IT resources, and complex integration with existing ERP or systems, each cited by 42% of respondents. Disruptive changes to current workflows followed at 36%, with competing priorities at 35%.
The takeaway is useful for ERP vendors and customers alike. Integration is necessary, but adaptability is becoming just as important. AP processes need to change as payment methods, vendor requirements, security expectations, and business volumes change. If every improvement requires scarce IT bandwidth, custom integration work, or workflow disruption, then integrated AP can still become rigid AP.
Payment Flexibility Is Required
The report also shows why payments are becoming harder for ERP providers to treat as an adjacent workflow.
Organizations reported that vendors prefer a wide range of payment methods, including credit cards, ACH, real-time or instant payments, wire transfers, checks, and virtual cards. More than a quarter of ERP users, 28%, cited limited payment flexibility as an AP pain point, and 61% said their organizations cannot always accommodate a vendor’s preferred payment method.
The gap is larger for organizations with weaker AP integration. Respondents with fully integrated AP workflows were more than twice as likely as those with mostly integrated workflows to say they can always accommodate vendor payment preferences, at 53% versus 20%.
That flexibility has direct operating consequences. When organizations cannot meet vendor payment preferences, the most commonly reported outcomes were increased manual work or workarounds at 55%, higher payment processing costs at 46%, and delayed vendor payments at 44%. Missed discounts or cost-saving opportunities were cited by 33%, while strained or at-risk vendor relationships and difficulty onboarding or working with certain vendors were each cited by 35%.
Independent payment data adds context. Nacha’s summary of the 2025 AFP Digital Payments Survey found that checks still accounted for 26% of B2B payments in the US and Canada. AFP also reported the median cost of initiating and receiving an ACH payment was between 26 cents and 50 cents, compared with $2.01 to $4.00 for issuing a check.
That does not mean every supplier will move to the same payment method. It means ERP and AP platforms need enough payment flexibility to support supplier preference, buyer economics, control requirements, and reconciliation needs without forcing users back into disconnected workarounds.
Value of Embedded Payments
Priority Commerce’s answer is embedded payments, and the report frames the opportunity primarily from the ERP provider’s perspective.
That makes sense given the audience. ERP providers increasingly compete on how much value customers can realize inside the platform. If payables remain a separate workflow, the ERP provider may still win the accounting system decision while losing influence over the payment experience, supplier interaction, and cash management workflow.
The report includes a Syspro case study around Pierce Pacific, a manufacturing company that managed vendor payments through a manual, check-based process outside core ERP workflows. According to the report, Syspro offered embedded payables capabilities through Priority Payables, helping Pierce Pacific integrate payment automation into its ERP workflow, replace manual checks with ACH and virtual cards, and reduce payment runs from one to two hours to less than 15 minutes.
That case study illustrates the underlying product question: Should payments be treated as an add-on workflow, or as part of the ERP experience itself?
Priority Commerce’s answer is that embedded payments should be a standard ERP capability. Customers may ultimately choose to keep existing bank relationships, payment providers, or AP tools, but ERP providers should still give them the option to fully integrate payment execution into the ERP environment. Without that capability, customers are forced into fragmented workflows before they ever get to make the choice.
ERP customers increasingly expect financial workflows to be connected, visible, flexible, and easier to change. If payment execution remains fragmented, the ERP platform carries the blame even when the failure sits in the workflow around it.
AP Modernization Has to Be Agile
The larger lesson is that AP modernization cannot stop at integration. Moving more payables activity into the ERP system improves visibility and scalability, but even integrated environments can become difficult to update when payment methods, vendor expectations, business volumes, and control requirements change.
What should the short-term action be? Finance and IT leaders should map where AP still leaves the ERP ecosystem. That includes invoice intake, approvals, vendor communication, payment execution, remittance, reconciliation, exception handling, and reporting. Any step that depends on spreadsheets, file uploads, email follow-ups, bank portal work, or manual rekeying is a place where ERP value is still leaking.
The longer-term implication is more strategic. AP modernization is becoming more automated, but there still is an agility problem. Businesses need payment workflows that can absorb new payment rails, supplier preferences, compliance requirements, fraud controls, and operating changes without turning every adjustment into an IT project.
That changes how embedded payments should be evaluated. The question is not only whether a provider can automate today’s payment run. It is whether the ERP platform can keep payables connected, governed, visible, and adaptable as the business changes. The next stage of AP modernization will belong to systems that make payment execution easier to evolve, not just faster to process.
What This Means for ERP Insiders
AP is becoming a sharper test of ERP value. Finance leaders do not experience ERP success only through general ledger accuracy or reporting access. They feel it in whether invoices, approvals, payments, supplier preferences, reconciliation, and cash visibility move through one controlled workflow without manual workarounds.
ERP providers need to treat payments as part of platform experience. Priority’s report shows that integration improves visibility and scalability, but users still struggle when AP workflows are hard to update, payment methods are limited, or supplier requirements push work outside the ERP. Product teams should evaluate AP by how easily customers can adapt payment workflows as business conditions change.
Embedded payments need to prove operational value, not just partnership value. The business case should be measured in reduced manual effort, fewer payment delays, better visibility, faster reconciliation, lower processing cost, improved supplier experience, and stronger platform adoption. ERP buyers should pressure-test whether embedded payment offerings simplify the workflow or simply add another vendor into the stack.
