How an 11-branch electrical distributor got $3.2M back on price files, rebates and freight

The problem

Brightline Electrical Supply sells $280M a year from 11 branches and buys $205M from 900 suppliers. Prices arrive as quarterly files, ship-and-debit claims must reach the manufacturer within 60 days, 14 suppliers calculate their own annual rebates, and freight is added unless an order clears a threshold.

A five-person AP team matched 62,000 lines a month and cleared the 4,000 that fell outside tolerance by splitting the difference. Checking the file version, the claim window, the rebate base and the freight terms on every line was far more work than the team had, so none of it was checked.

What Seeft found

Seeft repriced all 744,000 lines from the past 12 months against the file in force on each order date, checked every special-price sale for a claim, and recalculated every rebate from Brightline's own receipts.

• 25,300 lines billed above the file price, a net $2.1M, and about 3,000 lines shipped short but billed in full, $380K.
• 1,200 ship-and-debit sales never claimed, $860K, more than a third of it already past the 60-day window.
• Three suppliers calculating the rebate on the wrong base, $470K short, and $350K of freight charged against the suppliers' own terms.

What Seeft got back

Seeft filed one claim per supplier per month, citing the file version and the supplier's own terms. Within 12 months, $1.6M of price variances was credited, $630K of ship-and-debit claims was paid, $410K of rebates was corrected, $300K of freight was credited and $260K came back on short shipments.

Seeft now files ship-and-debit claims every week from the sales ledger, so every claim makes its window, and the price variance rate is down to 0.5 percent.