Trading Places: How to Find Wins for Both Finance and Employees

We speak to many finance leaders in small and midsize businesses who tell us that expense processes are inevitably cumbersome and create a lot of work for someone in the business. We understand the concern.

The common belief is that if you make the expense process simple for the rest of the business, you make more work for the finance team. But if you ask the rest of the business to take on more of the work, the process takes even longer and leads to frustration for employees. Perhaps even inaccuracies and shortcuts.

But, there doesn’t have to be a trade off. 

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You can easily capture receipts and populate expense claims from your phone

Compiling expense claims manually is incredibly time-consuming. It’s no wonder it’s rarely top of anyone’s to-do list and it’s put off until the last moment, meaning there’s a delay before the spend is recorded – let alone reimbursed.

But with the SAP Concur app it’s simple and fast. Employees just need to take a photo of the receipt and the data is automatically read and populated in an expense claim. It means employees can capture receipts and submit claims on the go. Research shows it speeds up the time it takes to compile a claim by up to 50%.

Employees win because their expense claims write themselves. The finance team wins because the automated data entry leads to a higher degree of accuracy and there’s no more chasing half-completed claims. Plus, expenses enter the system more quickly so it’s easier to manage the monthly balance sheet and you can reimburse employees quicker too.

You can embed policies in the system so it’s easy to be productive and compliant

Automation means rules can be set so that employees are alerted when an expense is out-of-policy or more documentation is needed.

Employees win because they are more informed and spend less time checking rules and policies. You and your finance team win because you know the right rules and approvals are being applied automatically so you can be confident in your compliance.

Managers can approve expenses on-the-go to speed up the process

SAP Concur has a simple mobile app that managers can use to review and approve expenses on-the-go. It means there are fewer delays than before. And research suggests the difference is dramatic – the review to reimbursement period is reduced up to 80% with automated solutions.

Employees win because they’re reimbursed more quickly. The finance team wins because shorter approval times mean you can schedule payments and manage capital more effectively.

You have a single simple interface to manage everything to do with expense

SAP Concur is a cloud-based tool that’s so intuitive to use, many people find they don’t need any training at all. You use the same system for expenses as you do for invoices (and travel, if you have a travel booking process) so there is less to learn. And it’s scalable, so the tool you’re using now can be the same tool you use when the company has grown in years to come.

Employees in the rest of the business win because they have a single intuitive platform to manage everything. You win because you spend less time training employees on separate systems and can be confident you have a tool that will scale as your business does.

These are just a few of the ways that expense automation can make life easier for the finance team and the rest of the business too. Download the report to learn more about elevating business performance and better managing spend.