Chrome River CURRENTS

As the U.S. economy continues to recover, organizations that previously cut travel to the bone are starting to look beyond revenue-generating trips, sending employees to conventions and other networking and development activities. As business travel and other travel and entertainment (T&E) spending increase, so does the value and importance of efficient, cost-effective travel expense management.

When your employees travel for business or entertain clients, are you getting the best prices for flights and rental cars, hotels and entertainment? It can be hard to say. After all, if you can’t see at a glance what your company spends on travel and entertainment (T&E) and drill down to important data, how do you really know? But if you use expense management software with end-to-end automation, your company will be in a much better position to negotiate volume discounts with vendors.

Whether in business, sports or warfare, we tend to admire leaders who make good decisions seemingly based on intuition and instincts. In today’s complex business world, however, gaining a competitive edge also requires calculated evaluation. Expense management analytics provide powerful tools that can help leaders make better decisions — decisions that combine quantitative and intuitive insights.

We’ve all heard the cliché “numbers don’t lie.” But numbers alone also tell few truths (unless you’re a mathematician). To make good decisions based on data, managers and executives need more than numbers. Analytics and accounting reporting software can help you create meaningful, actionable reports from raw data.

Welcome to the Chrome River Currents monthly digest! Each month we highlight the latest news and analysis on business travel, expense management and online expense reporting. This time, we’re focusing on the benefits of automating business expense reports. We’ll show you how new cloud-based tracking, analytics and reporting tools can help your company simplify travel reimbursement, negotiate discounts and other cost savings, and identify possible fraud. 

Contributing Author – Henry Ijams, Managing Director, PayStream Advisors, Inc. 

An invoice from a vendor arrives in the day’s mail and sets off a complex process. First, the invoice envelope must be sorted and opened, the return envelopes and ads tucked inside discarded. From there, your company may scan the invoice or key in data and begin validating individual items. By the time the document reaches an approver for payment verification, it’s no mystery why processing paper invoices is often expensive, inaccurate and inefficient.

The right expense management software can help reduce compliance risks and improve operational efficiency by using automation, electronic payments and analytics to increase transparency.

Providing corporate credit cards to employees has many financial and operational benefits, and it helps streamline travel expense management. Using corporate credit cards tends to reduce expense report fraud, but you’ll still need to keep an eye out for employees trying to beat the system.

Companies can reduce annual travel and entertainment (T&E) costs by 7 percent to 15 percent by using a comprehensive travel expense management system, according to a recent article on the Spend Matters website.