Who Cares About Vendor Management? The Treasury Function We Don’t Discuss
Why and How Treasury Teams Should Care About the Role of Vendor Management
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We go places. We do things. Join us!Why and How Treasury Teams Should Care About the Role of Vendor Management
[Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in August of 2023 but has been updated to reflect the changing landscape of vendor management—and treasury’s role in it.]
If it’s not obvious from the title, treasury departments, I am looking at you. Today, we’re going to discuss a treasury function that is rarely discussed or upheld. Yet, this treasury function can have a significant impact on an organization’s profitability.
Last spring I had the distinct pleasure of not only attending but presenting at both The Payments Academy and the Windy City Summit. Both conferences attracted treasury professionals from around the country.
At PaymentWorks, our customers and prospects are generally in A/P and Procurement. This was my first experience spending extensive time with those who live in the world of treasury.
Always looking to learn, I took advantage of my time at these conferences to pepper many of the attendees with questions about their jobs.
I wanted to learn what excited them at work and to understand and how they defined success.
Being a vendor management nerd, I also asked how many of them had anything to do with vendor onboarding and change management.
Below are several insights I gleaned from those conversations.
Update: Why This Conversation is More Urgent Than Ever
Organizational Silos: Vendor Management Not Viewed as a Treasury Function
How to Make Vendor Management Partly a Treasury Function
AI, Automation, and Vendor Risk: What the Treasury Function Needs to Know
Vendor Management is the Foundation of Your Organization’s Financial Health
What Treasury Teams Can Do Today to Support Vendor Management
Future-Proofing the Treasury Function for 2026 and Beyond
Blogs for Aligning Vendor Management and Treasury Teams
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Since this piece was first published, vendor impersonation scams have become more sophisticated, leveraging AI-generated voice and email spoofs. Treasury teams are increasingly expected to mitigate these risks and ensure compliance with emerging anti-fraud standards. In 2025, ignoring vendor management is a liability
Fraud isn’t just a risk—it’s a moving target. Criminals are getting more creative, more sophisticated, and more convincing. With the rise of AI, deepfakes, and social engineering, today’s fraud schemes are harder to detect and more costly than ever.
Here’s what’s on the rise:
Vendor Impersonation: Attackers pose as trusted vendors to submit fake invoices or change payment instructions. These scams often start with a well-crafted phishing email and end with funds vanishing into a fraudster’s account.
Deepfake Fraud: AI-generated audio and video now mimic executives with alarming accuracy. One urgent request on a video call from your “CFO” could trigger a six-figure loss if not verified through secure channels.
CEO Fraud: Scammers impersonate high-ranking execs to fast-track wire transfers or sensitive data. They exploit the instinct to act fast when orders come from the top—no matter how unusual the request.
Business Email Compromise (BEC): Hackers take over legitimate business email accounts to quietly manipulate conversations and reroute payments. These aren’t spammy messages—they’re detailed, researched, and look exactly like the real thing.
If this sounds like something from a crime thriller, it’s not—it’s happening now, and it’s getting worse. As fraud tactics become more advanced, staying one step ahead means treating every request with scrutiny, no matter how familiar or urgent it seems.
First, many of the treasury professionals I spoke with had “It’s Not My Problem” Syndrome when it came to vendor management.
However, I did learn about what excites treasury professionals about their jobs.
They’re excited about having an impact on the function, knowing exactly how much cash on hand would be needed and measuring the success of the improvements they implement on how their business operates.
When I asked the treasury professionals what doing a good job looks like for them, the answer was resounding. Success looks like getting things done on time. This was the verbatim answer from almost every single person I asked, “getting it done on time.”
My questions about vendor management, however, were greeted with a giant collective shrug.
Almost none of these professionals considered this a treasury function, aka a responsibility to be something that treasury needed to be involved with.
In fact, and I am quoting here, more than once someone said “that is not my problem.”
If we look at the data, the answer is not necessarily.
On a wide scale, it seems that treasury teams do care about processes–risk management, streamlined payment processes–that fall under the vendor management umbrella.
To sum up, I ask, how can where those payments end up not be a treasury “problem”?
The data within your supplier file is relied upon by your entire organization every day. Procurement, risk, finance, business departments, treasury…decisions are made, deals are struck and risk is assessed—or not—based on what has been input into your financial system.
But no one, save for the poor soul in charge of it, seems to actually care how that data gets into the ERP in the first place.
It could be inaccurate, outdated, not compliant, or a fraudster.
This needs to be everyone’s problem.
Luckily for you, we made it VERY easy for inaccurate, outdated, or fraudulent data to be everyone’s problem.
In fact, we made a whole podcast about it. Our recent episode of Risky Business is an interview with an anonymous vendor desk manager. She describes in-depth what it’s like to be the only one in an organization to pay attention to how data gets into the ERP.
I had the honor of co-presenting at Windy City on the topic of risk and vendor onboarding with Chris Arehart, SVP of Chubb, our insurance partner.
I work at a company that stops vendor impersonation and social engineering frauds. Chris works for a company that helps in the aftermath from successful frauds of these types.
As such, we’ve seen a lot and have a combined expertise in why these scams are so pervasive, and what organizations can do to avoid falling victim to a fraudster.
Independently, we’ve reached the same conclusion. Mainly, there isn’t enough respect, investment or care put into the vendor onboarding and management process. The prevailing perception is that vendor management = data entry.
Our presentation laid out why the treasury team (and frankly, everyone at your organization) should care about vendor management as a strategic gateway to better business and not, as it usually is, as a clerical function.
Additionally, Chris was honest about the lack of importance vendor management is given in many organizations.
He said, “We’ve seen a thousand plus claims of social engineering fraud. We’re the largest writer of fidelity and crime insurance in North America. So we see it all. And unfortunately, most clients report that they don’t have their process written down, because they don’t write down clerical processes. And I’m here to tell you, this is not a clerical job.”
The rise of AI tools creates a double-edged sword: fraudsters are using deepfakes to impersonate vendors, but treasury teams now have access to automated due diligence platforms that can analyze risk factors in seconds. The question is: are you using them?
AI-powered fraud is no longer speculative. There are recent, verified cases of organizations transferring millions of dollars based on voice-cloned phone calls or hyper-realistic phishing emails mimicking vendor executives. And the scary part? These attacks expose weak or undocumented vendor onboarding processes.
At the same time, treasury and finance teams now have access to technology that can help them take control of vendor data integrity. Tools powered by machine learning and automation can:
Cross-reference vendor banking and tax information with third-party databases in real time.
Detect anomalies or mismatches between vendor-provided data and verified sources.
Flag vendors operating in high-risk geographies or sanctioned jurisdictions.
Assess the financial health of suppliers to proactively identify at-risk partners.
In other words, AI doesn’t just help attackers — it can be your defense system, too.
But none of these tools matter if treasury isn’t at the table during the vendor selection or onboarding phase. Delegating vendor data entry to a single department or individual, without oversight or automation, puts the entire organization at risk — financially, operationally, and reputationally.
This is where modern treasury leadership comes in. Just as treasury owns the cash position and financial forecasting, it can also own the conversation around investing in intelligent, secure vendor onboarding. That means augmenting ERP workflows with automation that checks for accuracy, compliance, and fraud indicators before a single payment is released.
This investment pays off. Automated vendor validation reduces fraud risk while speeding up onboarding, strengthening supplier trust, and reducing internal friction between A/P, procurement, and treasury.
In a world where bad actors are using AI to exploit the cracks in your process, your best defense may be AI-driven process integrity. Treasury can — and should — lead the charge.
Think about these questions. First, do you want better business outcomes? Second, are you looking for a guarantee of meeting your goals of cash on hand and getting stuff done on time?
Then, you simply must start at the beginning. How secure are you in your organization’s foundational payment process? Think about your current process of gathering, vetting and inputting vendor payment data.
Think about what is at stake, and what you are asking of folks in vendor management roles. Would you trust an undocumented process with a low-wage, unskilled employee with a million dollars at stake? With five million?
This happens daily. It might be happening right now at your organization.
The great Debra Richardson (and keynote at our upcoming in-person event!) provides a clear and impactful description of this matter:
“Ok, Uncle!” you say. “I’m ready to care. But what exactly does that mean?”
It means understanding, investing in, and documenting the blueprint for your new foundation.
We recently announced the invention of my new favorite holiday: Vendor Management Appreciation Day on December 12.
As part of this six-month celebration, we’re giving away a ton of free gifts. The perfect gift for treasury teams is a tool you can use to begin the process of changing the paradigm around vendor management at your organization.
Yes, you can use this resource to make the treasury function of supporting vendor management extremely clear to your team.
Write it Down: A Template for Documenting Procedures for Supplier Onboarding and Change Management.
The Write it Down template is meant to be the push your organization might need to get all invested stakeholders on the same page about making some serious changes to your vendor management process.
To sum up, reviewing your current process and documenting it will serve to invest your organization in the value of this work.
Modern treasury functions can no longer afford to view vendors solely as payees. They’re partners — and weak partners create risk. Modeling vendor resilience is fast becoming a core treasury function, especially as global instability continues to affect supplier operations.
In the past, treasury’s role in vendor relationships often stopped at payment authorization and cash forecasting. But in today’s environment, that’s not enough. Geopolitical tensions, climate-related disasters, supply chain disruptions, and economic volatility have exposed the fragility of even long-established vendor networks.
A resilient vendor ecosystem reduces fraud, streamlines payments, and ensures business continuity.
Forward-thinking treasury teams are beginning to evaluate vendors through a more holistic lens, considering:
Geolocation risk: Is a key supplier in a region prone to political unrest, natural disasters, or cyberattacks?
Financial health: Is a vendor on solid financial footing, or showing signs of distress that could impact service delivery?
Sustainability and ESG factors: Does the vendor align with company values and regulatory expectations for environmental and labor practices?
Redundancy and diversification: Is your vendor portfolio overly reliant on a few critical partners or regions?
To make these evaluations actionable, treasury teams are tapping into tools that go beyond the ERP:
Vendor monitoring platforms that provide real-time updates on supplier health.
Climate and geopolitical risk dashboards that visualize supply chain exposure.
AI-driven scenario planning that models the impact of vendor failure on cash flow and operations.
This is no longer the domain of just procurement or supply chain. Treasury’s unique view into liquidity, capital strategy, and operational impact makes it well-suited to lead conversations around vendor resilience.
It’s time to shift from reactive to proactive. Vendor onboarding and management should be seen as both a fraud control measure—and a strategic lever to future-proof your organization.
Our recent blogs are full of actionable guidance.
Must-Know B2B Payments Trends For 2023 (With Original Data from PaymentWorks)
B2B Payments Fraud Fraud in Times of Chaos: 2023 Edition
Vendor Management Tips From the Experts Themselves
Vendor Impersonation Fraud: Takeaways and Tips
We’d love to walk through your process with you and talk about security, compliance, efficiency and sleeping better at night.
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