How Ping Identity cut resolution times by 65% using Hiver

Ping Identity, a global leader in identity security solutions, empowers enterprises with secure digital experiences. As the company scaled, its Accounts Payable (AP) team—responsible for vendor payments, credit card programs, and tax reconciliations—faced growing challenges. With a globally distributed team and rising vendor communications, it needed a tool to enhance collaboration and efficiency.

The Challenges

As Ping Identity expanded, managing vendor invoices and communications grew complex. The fact that they were using Gmail’s collaborative inbox to manage vendor communications led to significant challenges:

• Lack of visibility: Team members could not track invoice statuses, leading to duplicated efforts and missed follow-ups.
• Inefficient collaboration: Discussions about approvals occurred across Slack and email threads, causing delays.
• Manual workflows: Emails were assigned manually, wasting time and creating bottlenecks. Time zone hurdles meant distributed teams struggled to align priorities and track pending tasks.

Jill Tarnoff, Senior AP specialist, Ping Identity, explained:

We’d lose hours figuring out who handled what. With vendors across time zones, delays hurt relationships.

The Solution

Recognizing the inefficiencies in their accounts payable process, Ping Identity sought a solution that would streamline collaboration, improve visibility, and enhance overall efficiency.

With team members working across different time zones and handling a high volume of vendor  communications, they needed a platform that would integrate seamlessly into their existing workflow without adding complexity.

Ping Identity chose Hiver for its seamless integration with Gmail—a critical requirement since the AP team already relied on Gmail for daily operations. The need to adopt a tool without disrupting existing workflows made Hiver the ideal choice.

Here’s how Hiver helped Ping Identity overcome their challenges:

1. Real-time visibility into email ownership

The team could not track which invoices were being processed, leading to duplicate follow-ups and missed deadlines.

That’s where Hiver’s Shared Inbox made all the difference. It provided instant visibility into email ownership and status (e.g., “Pending Approval,” “Payment Processed”).

Custom labels replaced guesswork, allowing everyone to see who was handling what. This reduced confusion and eliminated duplicate efforts.

Jill noted:

We finally knew who was responsible for each invoice. No more chasing teammates across time zones.

2. Eliminate confusion with contextual Notes

Discussions about invoice approvals used to be scattered across Slack and email, delaying decisions. But with Hiver’s internal notes feature, teams can collaborate directly within email threads.

Example: “@John: Vendor updated their banking details—verify before processing payment” can be added as a note beside the email, replacing chaotic Slack threads.

3. Automate prioritization with smart Tags

Manually assigning emails to team members delayed urgent payments.

So, when Ping Identity switched to Hiver, they immediately set up automation to handle such tasks. These automated workflows could assign emails by vendor type (e.g., “Tax Partner,” “Software Vendor,” etc.). Urgent queries could be tagged as “High Priority,” alerting managers instantly.

As a result, critical invoices were no longer buried in crowded inboxes.

4. Cut through the noise with AI Summarizer

Lengthy email chains from vendors slowed down processing. However, the company overcame this challenge with Hiver’s AI Summarizer.

This feature extracts key details (e.g., payment terms, due dates) from long threads. For instance, a 10-email thread about a billing discrepancy was condensed into a 3-bullet summary.

Jill explained:

The summaries let us skip the backstory and focus on solving the problem.

The Impact

The adoption of Hiver has transformed Ping Identity’s AP team, significantly enhancing their efficiency and collaboration. By integrating Hiver into their workflow, the team has eliminated many bottlenecks that previously hampered productivity.

Hiver has completely transformed how we manage our workflow. The ability to collaborate within emails and track progress in real-time has eliminated unnecessary delays and made our team much more efficient.

said Jill from Ping Identity.

Now, the team has a well-organized, transparent system supporting daily operations and long-term financial planning.

Since adopting Hiver, Ping Identity’s AP team has experienced significant improvements in their day-to-day operations:

• Stronger team collaboration: Despite being distributed across different time zones, the team communicates more efficiently within Hiver, saving 89 hours every month.
• Increased efficiency by 45%: Clear status tracking and defined email ownership have minimized follow-ups and allowed team members to focus on high-priority tasks.
• Faster issue resolution: Real-time collaboration within email threads and AI summaries has significantly cut response times by 65%, particularly for time-sensitive vendor payments.
• Better organization and compliance: The ability to track and retrieve past emails ensures improved audit readiness and compliance with financial regulations.