Too Many Clicks for Simple Answers
Accounts Payable teams spend a surprising amount of time just trying to find information. Simple questions, like the status of an invoice, who needs to approve a payment, or whether an expense is reimbursable, often require clicking through multiple sections of Coupa or tracking down policy documents elsewhere.
Tyler Takaro set out to simplify that experience by building an Accounts Payable Glean Agent that consolidates financial data and policy knowledge into one conversational interface.
Coupa is the system of record for much of Abnormal’s financial data, but navigating it efficiently requires familiarity with where different types of information live. For Accounts Payable teams, this creates friction in day-to-day work.
Common questions, such as invoice status, approver identification, supplier details, or reimbursement eligibility, can involve jumping between Coupa screens or searching through documentation. Even when the information exists, the time spent finding it slows down approvals and increases frustration.
Tyler saw an opportunity to streamline these workflows by meeting AP teams where they already work and centralizing the answers they need.
A Unified Accounts Payable Assistant
The Accounts Payable Glean Agent acts as a single entry point for both financial data and policy questions. Users interact with it through chat, and the agent determines what kind of information is being requested.
If the request requires live financial data, such as invoice status or expense details, the agent routes the query to Coupa. If the question is policy-based, like whether an item is reimbursable or who to contact for approvals, the agent pulls directly from internal documentation instead.
To make this work, Tyler built custom Python logic running in AWS Lambda that securely connects Coupa and Glean. This allows the agent to fetch the right data dynamically and return it in a clear, human-readable format.
In practice, that means AP users can ask questions like “What’s the status of this invoice?” or “Who approves this purchase?” and get an answer immediately without leaving the chat interface.
What It Looks Like in Action
In testing, the agent can surface injected invoice data, identify approvers, return supplier information, and answer policy questions without requiring users to know where that data lives in Coupa.
While the demo environment is still evolving, the core experience is already clear: one place to ask, one place to answer, and far less time spent navigating complex systems.
Faster Answers, Less Friction
Even in its early testing phase, the Accounts Payable agent is changing how finance teams interact with data.
It reduces the time spent hunting through Coupa, lowers the learning curve for new AP team members, and makes routine questions easier to resolve. By consolidating both transactional data and policy guidance, it also helps ensure answers are consistent and reliable.
For AP teams, this means less time spent on process and more time spent moving work forward.
The agent is currently being tested by a group of around 30 users, with active feedback guiding the next phase of development. Upcoming improvements include expanding support for additional financial objects such as purchase orders and requisitions, as well as introducing role-based permissions.
Different users will be able to see different scopes of data, some limited to their own expenses, others to items they approve, and others to broader team-level views. This will allow the agent to scale safely across the organization while maintaining appropriate access controls.
Over time, the Accounts Payable Glean Agent is expected to become a core part of how finance teams interact with Coupa, transforming a complex system into a fast, conversational experience.
