More Than Half Of Companies Fear Being Left Behind If They Don't Adopt AI

According to the EPR - European Payment Report 2024 (EPR2024), more than a third (34%) of Portuguese companies "already use specific applications for individual 'back office' administrative tasks" and more than half (52%) "are carry out limited tests with AI, while 9% do not plan to invest in the technology and 5% have already generalized its implementation in their internal processes."

According to the study, "the application of technology and AI in credit recovery represents a significant advance and a great opportunity for companies, providing benefits such as greater efficiency, accuracy in payment forecasts, personalization in approaches and better risk management".

However, "EPR2024 reveals that companies recognize that they will need to invest in internal skills, invest in recruiting human resources to fill knowledge gaps or establish partnerships with companies that already use AI in their business processes."

Thus, "58% of Portuguese companies consulted in this Intrum study agree that they will face difficulties in finding the internal skills necessary to extract real value from AI (European average: 55%)".

Half (51%) agree that advances in AI will “significantly increase their ability to manage late payments” and “44% believe that innovation in payments (including real-time payments, P2P and cryptocurrency) is evolving too quickly to that organizations like yours can keep up with."

41% of companies recognize that if they do not implement AI tools in their administrative processes, "they will quickly fall behind competitors who are already doing so".

The study also reveals that "half of Portuguese companies believe that there is some risk of AI making wrong decisions based on customer data and that 63% fear that the use of these tools could jeopardize personal contact with customers".

More than half (56%) of respondents are unaware of how AI makes decisions.

At a European level, "EPR2024 highlights that half of managers believe that advances in AI can help manage late payments."

Artificial intelligence "has so many potential benefits that more than half of companies (54%) fear falling behind the competition if they do not use new payment technologies, and 46% believe this will happen if they do not use AI tools in their administrative processes."

More than half of European managers (55%) say they cannot find the skills internally to derive value from AI. This problem "is smaller in some countries - including Slovakia and Slovenia - that have invested in science, technology, engineering and mathematics education in recent years."

The European Payment Report 2024 is a tool to gain insight into the payment behaviors of European companies and examines trends related to payment delays, invoice payment practices and global financial risk.

The study is based on external research carried out by FT Longitude in 25 European countries.

"In total, 9,255 small, medium and large companies from 15 industry sectors participated in the survey" and respondents were chief financial officers (CFO) or other people with financial knowledge of the company they work for.

Companies were randomly selected from a B2B database and fieldwork for the study was carried out between December 5, 2023 and March 12, 2024.