Blog Post
Manual Order Entry: Still Common, Still Costly
Even in 2025, many manufacturers and distributors still rely on manual order entry. Purchase orders come in as PDFs, emails, even faxes. Teams then rekey this data into ERP systems line by line.
It’s familiar. It’s straightforward. It’s also incredibly expensive.
What looks like a simple task—typing in line items—actually introduces delays, risks, and inefficiencies that ripple across your entire business. And those costs compound fast.
The 5 Hidden Costs of Manual Order Entry
Let’s look at the true business impact of relying on manual processes to handle sales orders.
1. Lost Productivity
When teams are spending time on data entry, they’re not spending time on what really matters—serving customers, solving problems, or driving new revenue.
In many organizations, customer service and inside sales reps spend 20–40% of their time on manual order handling. That’s one to two full workdays per week per person—just entering data.
Multiply that across a team, and the hours (and salary dollars) stack up quickly.
2. Error Rates and Rework
According to APQC benchmarks, the average error rate for manual order entry is 1%–3%. That might sound small—until you realize that in an environment handling thousands of orders per month, it results in dozens (if not hundreds) of issues.
These errors often lead to:
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Mis-shipments
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Returns
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Re-invoicing
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Customer complaints
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Lost revenue
Every error must be identified, corrected, and communicated—which introduces additional manual work and costs.
3. Delayed Fulfillment
Manual entry introduces latency. Orders sit in inboxes. They’re queued for entry. They’re delayed due to staffing gaps or competing priorities.
In industries where lead times are tight, even a 4–6 hour delay can result in missed shipments, production downtime, or breach of SLAs.
Speed matters—and manual entry slows you down.
4. Employee Burnout
Repetitive, low-value tasks contribute to employee frustration and attrition. Manual order entry is often cited as a “mind-numbing” task that drains energy from high-potential teams.
In a time where hiring and retaining skilled operations staff is difficult, burning out your top performers is a risk you can’t afford.
5. Poor Data Integrity
Every time someone manually enters an order, there’s a chance for a typo, misread value, or copy-paste error. Over time, this leads to data fragmentation across your ERP and CRM systems—making it harder to report accurately or plan ahead.
Good data starts with clean input. Manual order entry compromises both.
The Opportunity Cost of Manual Work
Manual entry doesn’t just cost time and money—it costs momentum. Teams bogged down by order rekeying are slower to:
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Respond to customer needs
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Launch new offerings
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Identify upsell opportunities
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Adapt to supply chain changes
In 2025, agility is everything. The faster you can process, analyze, and act on order data, the more responsive your business becomes. Manual systems hold you back.
The Financial Impact: A Quick Math Exercise
Let’s say your customer service team handles 1,500 manual orders per month.
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Each order takes ~12 minutes to enter
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That’s 300 hours/month = 3.75 FTEs
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At $60K/year per employee, that’s $225,000 annually
Now factor in rework, returns, lost sales, and opportunity cost—and it’s easy to see why manual order entry is more than just a minor inefficiency.
Why It Still Happens
If the costs are this clear, why haven’t more companies moved away from manual entry?
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“It’s how we’ve always done it.” Legacy processes are hard to challenge.
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“Our customers won’t change.” But automation doesn’t require them to.
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“We don’t have the bandwidth to upgrade.” But the right tools integrate with your existing stack.
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“We’re not ready for AI.” But automation isn’t all-or-nothing—it can start with basic order intake.
The reality? It’s not a technology problem. It’s a priority one.
How Automation Solves This Problem
Modern platforms like Conexiom can process emailed or PDF-based POs and convert them into clean, accurate ERP entries—without human touch.
Here’s what that looks like:
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Purchase order is received via email
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Automation extracts and validates line item data
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Data is pushed directly to your ERP system
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Only exceptions are flagged for review
This shift from manual to touchless processing results in:
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80%+ reduction in order entry time
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90%+ reduction in errors
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Fewer customer escalations
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Happier, more strategic teams
Moving Forward: From Manual to Modern
Getting started doesn’t require a full digital overhaul. It begins with identifying:
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High-volume customers who submit repeatable orders
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Current exception rates and processing times
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The internal cost of manual handling
From there, automation can be introduced in phases—starting with your most impactful areas.
Final Thought
Manual order entry might seem manageable, but it’s a silent drain on your organization’s time, energy, and profitability.
In 2025, automation isn’t about replacing people. It’s about enabling them to do more impactful work—while orders process accurately, automatically, and without delay.
Want to see how much manual order entry is costing your business? Try Conexiom’s Ideal Order ROI Calculator or schedule a demo to see real-world savings.