Accounts Payable

Why this matters

Accounts payable in a municipality is where internal controls actually get tested. Every vendor invoice crosses through a department head approving it, a budget check ensuring funds are available, a duplicate-detection step catching the invoice that was already paid last week under a slightly different number, and a batch check run that has to produce positive-pay files the bank will accept. MuniNow's AP tracks invoices through draft → approved → scheduled → paid with GL entries posting automatically at each transition, and the duplicate detector fires on the exact (vendor, invoice number, amount) combination that most often gets paid twice. Line-item GL coding lets a single invoice split across multiple departments and funds — essential when a public works truck repair bills against five different street-maintenance accounts. Batch check runs process atomically (open → submitted → processing → completed) so no check is cut without a matching GL entry. Year-end 1099-NEC generation aggregates vendor payments by tax year and produces IRS-compliant output. And the six-bucket aging analysis shows the CFO which vendors are actually being paid on time — not what the policy says.