How AI Should Actually Handle AP Disputes (Not Just Flag Them)
- Direct Commerce
- 5 days ago
- 2 min read
When a supplier rejects an invoice, most AP teams already know what happens next. Someone has to step away from the job in front of them, whether that's a check run, a weekly payment cycle, or a hold they're trying to clear, and go dig through the history to figure out the answer. Again.
Daniel Shore, VP of Product at Direct Commerce, breaks down why that's the wrong place to put a human, and what changes when the system is built to write the rules instead of waiting for someone to write them by hand.
The pattern is already there. The system just has to use it.
If a supplier disputes an invoice the same way 99% of the time, whether it's a missing PO, a pricing mismatch, or a receiving issue, that's not a one-off exception. It's a pattern. And a pattern is something a system can learn from and act on, the same way a person would if they had time to sit down and look for it.
The problem isn't that AP teams can't spot these patterns. It's that spotting them requires stepping back from the job, and nobody has room in the day to do that consistently.
The real difference isn't the AI. It's whether it's built in.
There's a meaningful gap between opening an AI tool when you happen to have a spare moment, and having a system that's already out there, watching for these patterns, and building the rules before you ever ask. One depends on someone remembering to go looking. The other doesn't.
That's the distinction Daniel draws in the full platform walkthrough: rules that are visible, editable, and auditable, so finance and controls teams can trust what the system is doing and why.
See the full flow
This clip is one moment from a much longer walkthrough of the Direct Commerce platform, covering both the supplier and buyer sides: invoice capture, matching, dispute resolution, early payment, and the audit trail behind all of it.
Watch the full demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jo3PHCyp-vU
Direct Commerce is the industry's first Supplier First™ AP automation platform, built on one shared view for buyers and suppliers alike.
