The end-of-rebate-season scramble: you know it well. 

And while the stress of reconciling reams of data is certainly a headache in the short term… it could also be hurting your business in the long term. 

Reconciliation season: where does all the time go?

At your organization, there’s likely a complex web of rebate agreements among multiple stakeholders. Within those agreements, there are also multiple tiers of rebate possibilities. Seemingly endless product combinations exist. And there are so many deadlines for when you’re supposed to hit specific tiers to earn specific rebates. 

Needless to say, it’s challenging for retailers and distributors to keep track of all those terms and conditions, ensure data accuracy, integrate everything with your organization’s other platforms, and coordinate among multiple internal systems. 

During reconciliation, teams spend enormous chunks of time just trying to figure out what’s what: 

• What products did we get paid on?

• Which products did we miss the incentives on?

• Were our payments based on purchases or sales?

• Could we have been paid more if we’d made purchases during a specific time period?

Trying to sort through confusing, outdated or incorrect data to find clear answers to these questions is a massive challenge for retailers. 

Without better systems and platforms to manage all that information, it’s easy for numbers to get lost or inputted incorrectly. 

Short-term stress, long-term missed opportunities

When there’s no better way to manage and track real-time data, the administrative hurdles are high to reconcile the numbers at the end of the season. 

But there are also longer-term problems: that information gap leaves you floundering in the middle of the season, unsure of what levers you should be pulling to maximize your rebate opportunities. Should you be buying more of Product X? Should you pull back on promoting Product Y? Do you need to make all your Product Z purchases before a certain date?

Without easy access to (accurate) data, how would you know?

No visibility means no ability to fully take advantage of your opportunities. 

When all of these data problems coalesce, retailers end up with a few bigger-picture issues: 

• An extremely stressful reconciliation season

• Inefficient work to reconcile your data — and longer hours for your team

• Higher chance of mistakes within the data

• More difficulty calculating accurate nets

• Truncate your visibility over your rebate situation (instead of keeping a wider-ranging view year-round)

However, with a better bird’s-eye view of your overall rebate picture, your organization can save a lot of time — and a lot of headaches. You can also make better, more informed decisions about in-season actions you need to take in order to hit higher tiers and earn more rebate checks. 

Cleaner, more centralized data — that you can view year-round — can also help you:

• More effectively work on your nets year-round

• Have a clearer understanding of your margins

• Make better, revenue-driving decisions to improve profitability

With Smartwyre’s Business Performance Network, retailers can win that time back — and make the end-of-year reconciliation rush… not so rushed. Meanwhile, manufacturers benefit because they can easily publish program details, pricing rules, and incentive information to their selected retail partners. No more confusion about what or when retailers and distributors should buy — which can lead to more sales for suppliers.

An inside look at the revolutionary solution

If you want to learn more about the Smartwyre Business Network — and how you can put an end to stressful, inefficient reconciliation seasons, watch this 20-minute webinar to get an inside look at the platform’s features, like: 

• The ability for owners (manufacturers) to adjust their program year dates depending on the specific rebate program

• The condition achievement report, which allows businesses to track progress across multiple incentive programs, across multiple suppliers

• Functionality for manufacturers to set price rules for how to automatically calculate incentives

After watching the demo, you can also contact the Smartwyre team for more information about your organization becoming part of the Business Performance Network.