You have probably stopped calling it a payments problem
Most Controllers describe it in other words.
“That’s just applying cash.”
Someone works backwards through open invoices trying to find a combination that sums to the amount that arrived.
“That’s my tracker.”
A spreadsheet on someone’s desktop is the real source of truth for one thing the ERP cannot hold.
“Sandra handles that.”
One person can look at an unidentified deposit and say what it is. That knowledge exists nowhere else.
“We just clear it.”
A customer pays $9,847 against a $10,000 invoice. The $153 gets written off because finding out why costs more than $153. Nobody has added up a year of them.
“Close is always a scramble.”
It should take four or five days. It takes nine to twelve, and a meaningful share of that is matching payments and chasing exceptions.
None of that is filed under payments. All of it is payments.
Who this is for
CFOs, Controllers and COOs at Canadian distributors and wholesalers, $15M to $250M, where the friction is already visible and somebody needs an evidenced account of what is causing it before money gets spent on a fix.
This is not the first step in some mandatory sequence. If you are preparing for a change that has not happened yet – an ERP or finance transformation, an automation or AI initiative, a new platform or provider, an acquisition or expansion – start with the Payments Modernization Roadmap Sprint instead. It can be bought directly. A Diagnostic is not a prerequisite.
What it is
The Diagnostic follows one defined flow through the payments channel to identify where information, money and accounting records separate.
$4,500 CAD + HST. Delivered five business days after all required inputs are received.
One entity or business unit. One flow – receivables or payables, not both. One reason you are asking.
Within that flow: one ERP, up to three providers or channels, up to three stakeholder interviews, and a 90-day sample.
The single flow is the point. Examined properly, end to end, rather than five flows surveyed from a distance.
What you get
A written findings document in CFO language, vendor-neutral:
- Where the flow breaks, and what is causing it – with the evidence shown.
- An evidence-backed assessment of the payment flow, the material gaps and the business consequences.
- What the gaps cost, where the data lets that be calculated – and marked as not calculable where it does not.
- A sequence of moves ordered by what has to happen before what.
- A plain statement of what could not be determined, and what it would take to determine it.
- The decision this puts in front of you. If you can act on it without me, it says so.
Then ninety minutes to pressure-test it, with whoever needs to be in the room.
The fee is fixed at agreement. It does not move because the findings turn out to be inconvenient.
Vendor-neutral
I have no product to sell, no referral fee, and no platform to defend. If the answer is that your current provider is fine and the problem is a process, the document will say that.
What it does not establish
One flow, examined properly, is one input. It is not a modernization plan. The document separates and labels three things:
- Established within the flow examined – evidenced.
- Suggested about the rest of the business – inference, named as inference.
- Requiring broader work to answer – stated, with what that work would involve.
It is not assurance; I diagnose, specialists certify. It does not declare you ready for artificial intelligence, for regulatory and control change, or for international expansion. It is not enterprise architecture work, and it is not rate reduction.
Start with a 30-minute conversation
Enough to establish which flow and which trigger. If the Diagnostic is not the right instrument, that call is where it should come out, and saying so costs you nothing.
