Controlling T&E Expenses in 2014 is Still a Struggle for Many Companies

Many companies still struggle with controlling T&E spend, even ones that have automated the expense reporting process. Key areas that companies struggle in are: Mobility, Visibility of Spend and Integration

Forrester Research recently compiled a study where they found that many large companies in the US are still struggling to adequately control and manage travel related spend.

Most companies wait for their travelers and Accounting/AP personnel to manually key in T&E data into various systems after the trip is complete, which makes the reporting and compliance aspects become an ‘after the fact’ event. Another finding is that reporting and analytics of T&E data is usually rudimentary and primarily completed through spreadsheets, which was surprising!

Whole the research touched upon several topics, the key findings were:

1)     T&E systems used by companies are lacking in their mobile capabilities: A sizeable (>50%)percentage of the respondents feel that access to information via mobile devices is limited.

2)     Not many companies have real-time data on T&E spend: The study reveals that several companies do not have the capability to process receipts and expense data immediately to provide greater visibility of T&E spend to stakeholders.

3)     Manual keying-in of data: Many employees are still entering T&E data manually from/into various systems (ERP/Payroll/Travel) — even when the organization uses an automated T&E solution. This is time-consuming, error prone and wasteful.

4)     Data integration is a challenge: 42% of the companies are not able to import data from 3^rd party systems or ‘push’ data to the ERP system through integration which causes delays. Due to this, timely transmission of data does not happen which makes the T&E analysis delayed and error prone.

5)     Need more reporting. When respondents were surveyed on what capabilities their current T&E system lacks, the ability to run reports and analyze the data was one of the top answers.

Of course, these challenges are not new and Gorilla Expense is well positioned to tackle these challenges using our fully integrated expense management solution with end to end automation. Gorilla Expense customers have a much better chance of handling the mentioned challenges in the following ways:

1)     Gorilla Expense mobile apps allow the capture and submission of all expense data with receipts in a few clicks and less than 7 seconds. The submitted information is always available in the mobile app.

2)     Real-time T&E data is always available in our solution – whether it is corporate credit card data or receipts uploaded by a user or travel booking data that is imported into our system – with Gorilla Expense, all of this data is readily available and provides greater visibility into T&E spend for the stakeholders.

3)     Robust integration of expense data with systems like Microsoft Dynamics completely eliminates the manually keying of data into the ERP. This process is no longer time-consuming and wasteful.

4)     Built-in Reporting and Analytics is included in the Gorilla Expense solution. Users can query expenses, run reports to slice and dice data. Gorilla Expense can also create custom reports per unique needs of the company.

The research based on ~350 decision makers within the Corporate Finance division of these companies, also found that even in 2014, T&E expenses are the second most difficult area to control cost for companies. So, no surprises that companies are increasingly looking to find solutions that provide greater visibility and control over their T&E spend.

About Gorilla Expense

Gorilla Expense is a leading global provider of T&E Expense Management Software for Microsoft Dynamics ERP. Our Expense Reporting, Mobile Apps, Integration Services & Analytics solutions give customers the edge they need to compete in the global marketplace. With our powerful solution, we are constantly proving that – Expense management doesn’t have to be so difficult! Learn more at www.gorillaexpense.com

The post Controlling T&E Expenses in 2014 is Still a Struggle for Many Companies appeared first on goERPcloud.