💡 Digitize the Sales process (Order to Cash) with Odoo

A key lever to gain efficiency and traceability

How does Odoo facilitate digitalization?

The cycle Order to Cash (O2C) refers to all the steps that go from the customer order to the actual collection of payment.

It is a key process for commercial management, cash flow, and customer satisfaction.

🔁 The main steps of the O2C cycle:

1. Order taking
   → Recording the customer order (quote, commercial conditions)
2. Verification / validation
   → Available stock, payment terms, internal validation
3. Delivery
   → Preparation, shipping, delivery note
4. Invoicing
   → Automatic generation of the invoice after delivery
5. Customer follow-up
   → Monitoring deadlines, automatic reminders if needed
6. Collection
   → Receipt of payment, reconciliation and closure

🎯 Objectives of the O2C process:

• Accelerate collections
• Improve customer satisfaction
• Reduce disputes
• Ensure the reliability of sales data

A well-structured O2C is a direct lever for improving the cash flow.

🔹 Purchasing Module

• Automated creation of purchase requests
• Configurable validation workflows
• Order history and reporting

🔹 Inventory Module

• Receipt of goods with quality control
• Synchronization with the purchase order

🔹 Accounting / Invoices Module

• Automatic reconciliation between order, receipt, and invoice
• Automation of supplier reminders
• Preparation of payments (SEPA, transfer)

🔹 Dashboards

• Deadline tracking

🎯 Concrete case: Digitizing the Order to Cash cycle of an SME with inventory management via Odoo

The Context

An SME trading in electrical equipment used Odoo to digitize its business process:

• From customer order to payment collection
• With tracking of inventory and deliveries

🧩 Step 1: Entering the customer order

Sophie, a sales representative, receives an order for 200 LED projectors.

She enters the customer order in Odoo ("Sales" module) and thus fills in the following information:

• Selected customer
• Product references
• Commercial conditions applied automatically
• Proposed delivery times based on available stock

A PDF quote is generated and sent to the client with one click.

The client validates → the order changes to status confirmed.

📦 Step 2: Reservation and preparation of stocks

Upon order validation:

• Odoo automatically reserves the available stock
• The preparation slip is generated in the "Stock" module
• The logistics team prepares the products with a mobile terminal
• The items are taken out of stock in real time

In case of insufficient stock, a restocking is triggered.

🚚 Step 3: Delivery

The projectors are shipped from the warehouse.

The logistics team validates the delivery in Odoo, by scanning the packages.

A delivery slip is automatically generated and sent to the client.

The stock is updated immediately: the exit is tracked.

🧾 Step 4: Invoicing

The customer invoice is automatically generated once the delivery is confirmed.

It is sent by email, with a payment link if activated.

Odoo records the receivable and its due date.

The client can also find all their invoices in a client portal.

💬 Step 5: Follow-up and collection

The customer tracking module manages:

• The due dates
• Automatic reminders at D+5, D+15, etc.
• The matching of received payments

The payment is received (transfer or card) → Odoo records thecollection → the invoice is automatically matched.

📦 Step 6: Regular physical inventory

Every quarter, the team conducts a cyclical inventory :

• Odoo offers a selection of references to check
• The actual stock is compared to the theoretical stock
• Discrepancies are recorded and justified (loss, breakage, delivery error)
• The stock is regularized

Odoo generates reports on the reliability of the stock by location or category.

📊 Step 7: Analysis & management

The sales manager and the CFO access real-time dashboards:

• Average delivery time
• Customer service rate
• Customer receivables by salesperson
• Revenue evolution
• Stock reliability

✅ Results obtained

• Time savings in order processing
• Zero re-entry between sales, stock, invoicing
• Improvement of the cash via automated reminders
• Stocks updated continuously
• Better customer satisfaction

Some figures: 

• 📉 Reduction in order processing time: -40%
• ⏱️ Average delivery time reduced by 2 days
• 📦 Stock reliability (deviations < 2%): +30% in 3 months
• 💰 Cash improvement: collections +20% faster
• 📞 Decrease in customer disputes: -40% 
  

👥 Distribution of roles and responsibilities in the Order to Cash cycle

The O2C cycle therefore involves several services: sales, logistics, sales administration and accounting. A good separation of tasks is essential to secure the process.

• Sales department : order entry and tracking, pricing conditions
• Logistics / warehouse : preparation and shipping of goods
• ADV / invoicing : issuing invoices, tracking deliveries
• Accounting / finance : reminders, collections, reconciliation

⚠️ Risks of poor separation of tasks

• Internal fraud : if the same person can both validate an order, generate an invoice, and collect
• Undetected errors : delivered orders but not invoiced, or invoices sent without actual delivery
• Customer disputes : in case of duplicates or omissions
• Cash loss : uncontrolled collection delays

Digitalization with Odoo allows for structuring roles, tracking actions, and implementing differentiated access rights, to secure each step of the cycle.

Advanced Conseil supports you in digitizing your sales process

At Advanced Conseil, we combine accounting expertise, mastery of digital tools, and field experience to help you structure and automate your Order to Cash.

Thanks to solutions like Odoo, we assist you in :

• The modeling of your business process
• The implementation of validation workflows
• The integration between sales, inventory, and accounting
• The monitoring of key indicators (work in progress, DSO, sales performance)

Our goal: to help you save time, secure your flows and accelerate your cash flow.

Do you want to take action? Let's talk about it.