Are you sick of dealing with those B-Notices? (I know I am.) We had a really excited note from Laurie Nossair who shared her secret for ridding her organization of 98% of its B-Notices. Here's what she wrote. "I thought I would drop you a line to let you know we just received our B notice from the IRS for our 2006 1099 Misc reporting. I am happy to report we had just four incorrect name/Tin(s) this year. We have been using the IRS TIN matching website to verify W-9 information when we receive it from our vendors. Last year we had two double sided pages of incorrect Tin numbers."

What her note proves is that really and truly reducing B Notices is within reach of virtually everyone reading this. The TIN Matching program is open to everyone filing the following information returns: 1099 MISC; 1099 INT; 1099 DIV; 1099 B; 1099 OID and 1099 PATR.

To help our readers, we sponsored a Webinar on how to use the TIN Matching Program. CDs of that event are still available.

If you were not as lucky as Ms. Nossair and find yourself inundated with B-Notices, you might want to join us on November 1 for a Webinar. Once again, Jerry Michael and his staff have agreed to provide expert intelligence on the handling those awful B- Notices. So if you find your desk piled high with B- Notices, our webinar might be the answer.

The most common 1099 Form, at least for our readers, is the 1099 MISC. And as those who deal with it each year are ever-so-painfully aware, filling it out correctly is not as easy as we'd like. That's why when we decided to devote a one-hour Webinar to this topic, Jerry Michael went out and recruited a speaker from industry to help him with this session. So, not only will attendees benefit from Jerry's broad wealth of knowledge and expertise on this topic, they will also hear from a professional who is responsible for the issuing these forms for one of the largest companies in this country. He is considered one of the leading experts on this topic.

We had a really fine article in our fall vendor issue. It was written by Accuity's Bob McKay. We've got an excerpt from it here. If you did not see it and would like to get a copy of the entire article, send an e-mail with the words Straight Through in the subject line to publisher@ap-now.com and we'll send you a copy of the entire piece.

Increased Payment STP = Decreased Error Spending

Looking to increase your profits and soften your spending for transaction errors? The answer is quite simple: increase your payment straight through processing (STP) rates. Even the smallest increase in STP rates can result in significant savings for any size company. Below is a common example of the unnecessary costs that a sample corporation is paying because of low payment STP rates:

Part A
Lets use the example of an average corporation of 500+ employees with a reasonable daily payment volume of 100 transactions (payroll checks twice a month, vendor payments, expense checks, etc.). With about 260 business days a year, weekends subtracted and give or take a few holidays, the annual payment volume would equate to:
100 daily transactions X 260 business days = 26,000 transactions per year.

To see this article in its entirety request a reprint by sending a note to publisher@ap-now.com

I had a note from Will Yancey about the ongoing saga in California regarding unclaimed property. He wrote, "On Friday night October 12 at 6:00 PM federal Judge Seeborg in Suever v. Westly / Connell (San Jose) ruled in plaintiffs' favor and found the seizure of interest payments by the Controller from the 8.7 million accounts in the Unclaimed Property Fund was unconstitutional. Accrued interest must be restored to the $5.1 billion in private funds. Some of the accounts have been accruing interest since 1959. The estimated amount of private funds taken is (was) at a minimum of $500 million (per the California State Treasurer's report on the litigation in California bond disclosures), but probably in excess of $1 billion."

Yancey will join Tracey Reid on November 8 to discuss the ongoing drama in California, what it means as far as unclaimed property reporting an remitting for those doing business in that state and the likely implications as other states react to the outcome. Before you get ready to start celebrating, let me caution that most experts expect organizations to have more work, rather than less, as a result of this matter.

In addition to speaking on this Webinar, next year on April 25, Reid and Yancey will join Brooke Spotswood, Esq. for an all-day intensive seminar on Unclaimed Property Best Practices. It is designed for both those currently reporting to ensure they are dotting the i's and crossing the t's as well as those looking to get in compliance. The speakers, none of whom currently do any work for the states, have all agreed to deduct the cost of this seminar from their fee of any attendee who attends the conference and hires them within 24 months of the event.

IQPC's fourth Annual Procure-to-Pay Summit will be held January 28 - 30, 2008 at the Hilton Garden Inn in Orlando, SeaWorld International Center, Florida. Click on the link below for additional information and or to register. You can also call 1-800-882-8684.

The entire staff of Accounts Payable Now & Tomorrow applauds all the hard-working professionals in the accounts payable profession as we mark Accounts Payable Recognition week. There's still a little time to sign up for Thursday's low-cost Accounts Payable Best Practice webinar. Until next week, thanks for listening.
Mary Schaeffer
Accounts Payable Now & Tomorrow