Top Use Cases for Intelligent Document Processing

In a time where the world faces different and quickly changing challenges – not only in terms of economy but also geopolitically – customers are increasingly looking for new ways to optimise their processes to achieve greater operational excellence, improve the customer experience, and accelerate business value. They have often heard that intelligent document processing (IDP) has the potential to help them achieve these goals by making the revenue-generating information, that’s trapped within their business documents, more accessible.  

But before investing, customers want to know the results IDP has delivered in other businesses’ use cases and understand how the benefits can be applied to their own. This is why ABBYY, a global leader of intelligent automation solutions, decided to disclose information about how more than 10,000 customers worldwide are leveraging the various capabilities of its intelligent document processing portfolio. Using internal data generated through its IDP technology, they observed several interesting trends in three key regions (Europe, North America and APAC) that provide insight into which types of documents enterprises are succeeding with the most using IDP.   

While certain trends demonstrated distinctly global impact, such as the need to accelerate processing of invoices and identity documents, each region demonstrated a different focus area for their most requested document processing skills. This article summarises the top document types being prioritised for IDP in each region, along with examples of how customers are using IDP to achieve the business results they desire.

In Europe, document processing priorities for customers focus highly on transportation-and-logistics-related documents, with 41% requesting document processing skills for air waybills and 27% requesting skills for customs declarations documents and international consignment notes. We attribute this trend to the high prevalence of commerce between the EU and non-EU member countries, particularly following Brexit.  

Carlsberg Group, a global leader in brewing, uses IDP solutions to automatically capture incoming orders and transfer them immediately into their SAP system. This saves up to eight minutes of manual work per order, depending on the region. In Sweden, this saves over 140 hours per month and yields a touchless order processing rate of 92%. Carlsberg also relies on IDP for delivery note scanning in warehouses, accelerating the registration of delivered goods and providing a more holistic overview of the entire delivery process.

Customer data from the United States and Canada revealed that the top three document processing priorities are for IRS 1040 tax documents (29%), identity documents (22%), and invoices (17%). As the data was pulled in Q4 of 2022, the emphasis placed on tax documents can be attributed to upcoming tax deadlines in April, for both the US and Canada.  

Invoice processing is a priority for many customers and represents a key document use case for IDP that repeatedly delivers significant impact on processing efficiency and effectiveness.  

JLL – a commercial real estate giant – used a cloud-based IDP solution to save millions by automating invoicing and payment processes. This global S2P automation initiative exceeded the Fortune 500 company’s business goals and led to the CIO 100 award, acknowledging ABBYY and JLL’s success in setting a new standard in Source-to-Pay.

In Asia-Pacific, the need for international shipping document process skills also resonated, with 35% requesting IDP for air waybills and sea waybills. Identity documents and financial documents (bank statements, invoices) are high in demand as well. These trends reflect the high volume of exports and international commerce originating from the APAC region, as exports begin to rise following the decline from the COVID pandemic. 

The Tokyo district of Nakano-Ku, reduced their work volume by 30% and cut outsourcing costs by 25% by using IDP to digitally transform its resident tax collection process. Their solution automated the extraction of over 100 different handwritten and printed paper forms of various sizes and shapes, which had previously been done manually. Even with the differing tax rates, structures, and data formats of districts across Japanese local governments, IDP offers a repeatable and scalable solution to be used nationwide. 

In addition to revealing the top five most requested document types for IDP in each region, the ABBYY Global Intelligent Document Processing Trends & Outcomes Report also shares data about providers of partner IDP solutions, as well as connectors that its customers are using to integrate IDP into third-party automation platforms from Microsoft, Ui Path, and others. Based on what has been observed with the customer base, the report also identifies current trends that are driving IDP adoption in the market today and recommendations for implementation. 

 The full report can be accessed here.