Supplier Onboarding and Due Diligence Checks
Onboarding a new supplier means collecting a stack of documents — tax registration, banking details, insurance certificates, sanctions and beneficial-ownership screening — chasing them individually by email, and manually checking each one before the supplier gets set up in the ERP. It's slow enough that departments start working with unapproved suppliers just to hit a deadline, and thorough enough only when someone remembers every check on the list, which under time pressure doesn't always happen. The real risk isn't a missing document; it's a due-diligence check that gets rubber-stamped because the person doing it is buried and the red flags aren't obvious from a document sitting in an inbox.
STARTING PRICE
From €299
Standard tier · Multi-step workflow with AI extraction/decisioning and 2-3 integrations.
Get a quote →Saves roughly 3-5 hrs per new supplier onboarded.
How the automation works
We build an onboarding workflow that requests the required documents from the supplier automatically, validates each one as it arrives (registration numbers checked against government registries, insurance dates checked for currency, banking details checked against the stated legal entity name), and runs sanctions and beneficial-ownership screening against watchlists as a standard step, not an optional one. Rather than only checking that a document exists, the system checks what's in it against known red-flag patterns — a registered address that's a mail-drop or shared with dozens of unrelated companies, a beneficial owner that doesn't match the entity name, a newly formed entity bidding on a large contract — and escalates those specifically for human review instead of letting document-presence alone clear the supplier.
Process flow
- 01
Onboarding initiated trigger
A new supplier request triggers automatic document collection requests sent directly to the supplier, with reminders for anything outstanding.
- 02
Validate documents ai
Each submitted document is checked for completeness and currency — registration numbers, insurance expiry dates, banking details matched to the legal entity name.
- 03
Run sanctions and ownership screening integration
Sanctions lists and beneficial-ownership registries are checked automatically as a standard step for every new supplier, not an optional add-on.
- 04
Flag red-flag patterns ai
Shell-company indicators — shared mail-drop addresses, ownership structures that obscure the real beneficiary, newly formed entities on unusually large contracts — are flagged specifically, beyond simple document presence.
- 05
Escalate flagged suppliers output
Suppliers with red-flag patterns are routed to a compliance reviewer with the specific concern documented, rather than being cleared automatically once documents are present.
- 06
Activate in ERP integration
Cleared suppliers are set up automatically in the ERP with validated banking and tax details, ready for purchase orders.
Inputs
- Supplier-submitted onboarding documents
- Sanctions and watchlist databases
- Beneficial-ownership and corporate registries
- Existing approved supplier master data
Outputs
- Validated supplier record in the ERP
- Compliance screening report per supplier
- Escalated red-flag review queue
- Onboarding completion audit trail
Works with
Prefer a fully custom build instead of an off-the-shelf integration? We scope both options during your free consultation — most jobs like this one work fine on standard connectors, but higher-volume or non-standard systems sometimes need bespoke API work, reflected in the complex tier.
Where this goes wrong if you get it wrong
- Checking only that required documents exist, without checking what's in them, misses the actual risk — a due-diligence process needs to validate content against red-flag patterns like shell-company indicators, not just confirm a PDF was uploaded for each checklist item.
- A registered address shared with dozens of unrelated companies, or a beneficial owner that doesn't match the legal entity name, is a shell-company red flag that needs escalation to a compliance reviewer, not a pass/fail automated check that either approves or silently rejects.
- Sanctions screening against a name alone produces false positives on common names and false negatives on deliberately obscured entities — screening needs to include registration numbers and beneficial-ownership data, and near-matches need human review rather than automatic clearance or automatic rejection.
- Departments under deadline pressure will route around a slow onboarding process by working with an unapproved supplier informally — the automation needs to be fast enough for routine, low-risk suppliers that people don't have an incentive to bypass it, reserving the slower manual path for genuinely high-risk cases.
Frequently asked questions
What counts as a shell-company red flag?
Indicators like a registered address shared with many unrelated entities, beneficial ownership that doesn't match the stated legal entity, or a newly formed company bidding on unusually large contracts relative to its size — these get escalated for human review, not auto-approved or auto-rejected.
Does this replace legal review for new suppliers?
No — it automates document collection, validation and screening, and escalates genuine red flags to a compliance or legal reviewer rather than making the final approval decision itself.
How does sanctions screening handle common names?
Screening uses registration numbers and additional identifying data alongside the name to reduce false positives, and any near-match still routes to a human reviewer rather than auto-clearing or auto-blocking.
How fast can a low-risk supplier be onboarded?
Routine suppliers with clean documentation and no screening flags can often be onboarded in a day or two once documents are submitted, compared to weeks of email chasing in a fully manual process.