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EXPENSE MANAGEMENTSOFTWARE SOLUTIONS
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Expense management is a necessity in order to run a business. Employees incur reimbursable business
expenses for a variety of reasons: business travel, sales expenses, local purchases and mileage
reimbursement to name a few. And most of the time, they pay out of pocket and get reimbursed by the
company later. However, the manual process of submitting reimbursement forms and receipts to obtain
approval from the appropriate person can be costly and time-consuming.
Enter automated expense management systems. This report will explain what companies should look
for in expense management software, its features, and profile today’s top 5 software vendors.
What is Expense Management?Expense Management refers to the process of the company paying employee-initiated business
expenses. For example, these expenses can include hotel and travel for an employee to attend an indus-
try-related conference or mileage expenses to attend a local meeting. Even companies without a lot of
traveling employees likely spend a lot on expenses, such as office supplies or food for company events.
Some industries such as construction also frequently have employees that purchase their own materials
and are later reimbursed.
The employee typically pays for their expense with their own funds or a charge card provided by their
company. Most companies issue a policy outlining which expenses are valid and reimbursable. To be
reimbursed, the employee usually submits the expenses along with receipts and other supporting docu-
mentation to a manager for approval.
Upon approval, the expenses are routed through a payment process and may be subject to further
audit and review. Funds are reimbursed to the employee and/or the corporate charge card to settle the
amounts due. Finally, the expense and payment information is updated in the company’s financial systems.
Benefits of Expense Management SoftwareThe process of expense management can be costly, time-consuming, and prone to mistakes when con-
ducted manually. And it can be difficult for a company to enforce their business expense policy.
Looking for anExpense Management Software Vendor?Our Top 5 Expense Management Solution Companies
Brought to you by
Expense management software streamlines the process and allows employees to focus on important
parts of their jobs. It reduces or eliminates errors, gets employees paid faster, reduces internal process-
ing costs, and encourages compliance with policies. In addition, automated expense management
eliminates the costs involved with processing paper documents and makes the accounting and payables
departments more efficient.
In addition, companies can use expense management software to gather information to aid in
planning, budget management, policy compliance and other key management needs.
Who Uses Expense Management Systems?Users of automated expense management range from small businesses to large companies with multi-
ple locations. However, according to a recent survey by Certify, out of 165 companies surveyed, about
50% still manually keep track of their expenses. But these companies recognize that the manual process
is inefficient and costly, as 64% of small businesses and 72% of large enterprises plan to switch to a
cloud-based expense management system within the next year.
So, who uses automated expense management systems? Users vary by industry, from healthcare to
retail to finance. A typical user in a company falls into one of three categories:
1. Users – Those employees that incur reimbursable business expenses
2. Approvers –Managers who are responsible for approving user-submitted expenses
3. Administrators – Administrative employees responsible for the overall operation of the
expense management process for the company
However, expense management systems go beyond reimbursement approval. For instance, HR can
use the system to record employee information, such as pay rate, timesheets, etc, for payroll. Executives
can also use the system to analyze financial data and approve the company budget. Since employee
business expenses can be the third highest controllable expense in a company, there are many areas
that have a stake in the information and controls surrounding this area.
Common Features of Expense Management SoftwareAutomated travel booking – Expense management software allows for booking hotel and
flight right from the system – which saves the user time in having to re-enter the data.
Integration with a company credit card – The expense management software allows for
importing expenses from the card provider and pre-populate the user’s expense report, ensuring
accurate expense data and reducing employee data entry and the use of employee funds.
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Digital receipt attachment –Most automated expense management software lets users attach
receipts in digital form, either through a fax or email attachment within the software itself. The
user just needs a means to convert the paper receipt to a digital form, such as a scanner, camera,
or fax machine.
Compliance with Corporate Policy – Some expense management software sends alerts to
users that the expense may be in violation of company policy or a risk of overspending – even
before the expense is submitted. It then gives the opportunity for the user to correct the mistake
or provide an explanation.
Audit Services –While the goal of expense management software is to comply with company
reimbursement policy, and the approver should be ensuring this, it is still common practice to
audit expense reports as a final step. Whether you audit 100% or just a select percentage based on
risk factors, you will need a process to do this. Expense Management solutions often provide audit
processes within the software.
Mobile access –Many expense management solutions offer mobile support. Users can access
their expense data and even make travel plans from any device with an Internet connection,
including a tablet or smartphone.
What to Look For When Purchasing Expense Management SoftwareThere are many options to choose from when selecting expense management software. Most vendors
today offer a cloud-based (Software-as-a-Service or SaaS) solution. Some offer a more traditional
installed software package for on-premise management by the client’s IT organization.
Before purchasing any solution, companies need to first figure out what they plan to use expense man-
agement software for – i.e., do they have a lot of employees that travel and need reimbursement?
Companies should list what requirements they have for the software before researching solutions and
meeting with the vendors.
These are the top things companies should consider when purchasing an expensemanagement solution:
Cost – There are several pricing options when buying expense management software, such as per
transaction, fixed monthly fee, monthly per-user fee, to name a few. In comparing fees across
multiple vendors, you may want to consider the total annual cost of ownership. Be careful to
watch for hidden fees, such as monthly minimum transaction fees, additional services fees, fees
for non-users such as administrators, approvers, etc.
Ease of Use – Expense reports tend to be time-consuming, so you’ll want make sure the system
is easy to use for everything involved to the expense reimbursement process.
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Support for policies – Make sure the system can support the specific rules the company has in
its own expense reimbursement policy.
Scalability – Does your company anticipate making any changes to its procedures or systems in
the future? If so, you’ll want to find a solution that offers the ability to scale up or down, especially
if any additional employees are expected to use the software.
Ability to integrate existing hardware, databases, and systems - Make sure that the soft-
ware is compatible with any other hardware or software your company uses. This is especially
important for Accounting, HR, and Finance to ensure this software can work with their payroll
systems to provide timely reimbursement.
Input from users - The company will need to get buy-in for the software, not just from the top
executives, but all the employees that will be using the system. One way to do that is to get those
users involved in choosing the system – for example, have them participate in software
demonstrations.
Training and support after software deployment - Does the vendor offer training
remotely or onsite? You’ll want to choose a vendor that can provide training at your company’s
convenience, if feasible – for example, having a rep conduct training sessions to multiple users at
the company’s site. Also, make sure if the vendor provides support after the software is deployed,
such as 24/7 tech or customer service support via phone or online.
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Top 5 Expense Management Software VendorsBelow we’ve listed our five top companies to guide you in your expense management software purchas-
ing. Within each company, we’ve listed its profile, key features of its system, and customers that have
used it.
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Certify LLC20 York Street, Suite 201Portland, ME [email protected]
Key Links:Certify Free Trial: https://www.certify.com/FreeTrial.aspx
Certify Videos: https://www.certify.com/VideoDemos.aspx
Certify Whitepapers & more: https://www.certify.com/VideoDemos.aspx
Certify Customer Success: https://www.certify.com/VideoDemos.aspx
Certify's Automated Expense Management: https://www.certify.com/CertifyReportExecutive.aspx
Certify Mobile: https://www.certify.com/CertifyMobileOnTheGo.aspx
Company Profile:
Certify is a web-based, easy-to-use expense reporting and travel booking solution for all sized organiza-
tions. With automated expense reporting and streamlined workflow, Certify can eliminate the need for
spreadsheets and paper receipts while reducing the time spent creating, approving and reimbursing an
expense report. Gain insight into your travel and entertainment spend with Certify’s Suite of Reports,
employee policy enforcement tools and audit/trend analytics.
At Certify, innovation is one of the many driving forces behind its industry-leading product. Certify is
continuously creating and developing revolutionary features built to pivot themselves into the top spot
for expense management systems. The latest innovation from Certify is the industry’s first fully
automated expense management system, called ReportExecutive™, a feature that comes standard with
the Certify service.
Certify’s service now automates the creation and delivery of expense reports to employees at pre-
defined intervals, saving employees hours of time every month and delivering visibility into employee
expenses before corporate credit card bills are due.
With ReportExecutive™, Certify users can now scan receipts from their mobile device or desktop com-
puter into Certify and the software automatically creates a complete, policy-compliant report from
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those expenses on the day specified by accounting. Finance employees can schedule Certify to create
reports on a weekly, twice-monthly or monthly basis, and the software notifies employees when reports
are ready to review. For companies with flexible reporting policies, individual employees can set their
own schedule for expense report submission. With Certify’s automatic credit card integration, employ-
ees automatically receive corporate card charges populated in their expense reports, dramatically
reducing reconciliation time for accounting personnel.
Finally, Certify’s Cleanup Wizard quickly guides users to add any missing data items before submitting
the report online for approval.
Certify is among the fastest-growing cloud expense management software vendors. Launched in
2009, the service is used by thousands of employees at companies including Pitney Bowes, Subway
Sandwiches, Little Caesars Pizza and Dr. Maartens Shoes. In 2012, Certify released the industry’s first
mobile app to automatically populate expense reports using the camera on a smartphone or tablet. Cer-
tify is still the only expense management vendor to offer this feature, which it calls ReceiptParse™.
Certify’s mobile app, including ReceiptParse, is available for all major mobile platforms, including iOS,
Android, Windows and Blackberry.
Key Features:
Auto-Generated Expense Reports with Report Executive
Company-Wide Scheduled Automated Expense Reports
Mobile Applications for On-The-Go Functionality
11 Methods to Capture Receipts & Expenses
Integrated Travel Booking Solution
Spend Reporting, Auditing & Analytics
Global Functionality with 64 Languages and 120 Currencies Options
Enforce Corporate Travel and Expense Policies
Sync Corporate Credit Card Transactions
Integrate with Accounting Systems
Live & Web-Based User Training
Live Customer Support for All Users
Customers:
Pitney Bowes
Zoll Medical
Little Caesars Pizza
Subway
Daktronics
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800-Flowers
Atlanta Hawks
Larkspur Hotels
Netscout
Wingstop
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ConcurNorth American and Worldwide Headquarters601 108th Ave NE, Suite 1000 Bellevue, WA 98004Phone: 1-800-401-8412Fax: 1-425-590-5999Web:www.concur.comBlog:www.concur.com/blog
Key Links:2013 Expense IQ Report - https://www.concur.com/en-us/lp/expense-iq-report?pid=pr&cid=8dd1d29
App Center - https://www.concur.com/en-us/app-center?icid=en_us_h2_appcenter
Resource Center - https://www.concur.com/en-us/resource-center
Integrated Travel and Expense Overview - https://www.concur.com/en-us/resources/integrated-travel-expense-overview
Company Profile:
Concur is a leading provider of integrated travel and expense management solutions. Through Concur’s
open platform, the entire travel and expense ecosystem of customers, suppliers, and developers can
access and extend Concur’s T&E cloud. Concur’s systems adapt to individual employee preferences and
scale to meet the needs of companies from small to large.
For organizations, Concur helps ensure that corporate travel is booked within policy before the trip is
taken and reconciles expenses after travel is completed. And by delivering electronic receipts – from
airlines, hotels, and car rental companies – directly into expense reports, Concur virtually eliminates
the need to track and manage paper receipts.
To keep employees productive while traveling, Concur’s mobile applications enable business travelers
to keep track of and share their travel plans, create, review and approve expense reports and book and
change travel itineraries, all from a smartphone.
By capturing and reporting on every aspect of T&E spend, Concur’s services provide detailed informa-
tion to help clients effectively negotiate with vendors, create budgets and manage compliance. Trusted
by businesses of all sizes in more than 100 countries, Concur’s on-demand services process over $50
billion in T&E spend a year – equal to roughly 10 percent of the world’s T&E spend.
Key Features:
Concur® Travel and Expense:
End-to-End Travel and Expense:
Book employee-preferred, in-policy travel
Manage travel and expense anytime, anywhere with mobile apps (Concur mobile app, TripIt®Pro)
Get accurate data with e-receipts
Built-in compliance controls flag out-of-policy spending
Three-way match ensures accuracy
Concur Open Booking – you want control. Your employees want choices. We have the answer.
Customers:
Elizabeth Arden
Ericsson
T-Systems
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United Health Group
University of Colorado
Unisys
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Key Links:ExpenseWatch.com Expense Reports Video Demonstration
ExpenseWatch.com Customer Profile with American Medical Technologies
ExpenseWatch.com Expense Reports Product Overview
Company Profile:
ExpenseWatch.com Expense Reports empowers you to spend with confidence. It transforms time-con-suming and costly manual expense reporting into a comprehensive automated expense managementsystem, providing complete visibility and control over expense spending.
If you’re likemost companies looking to bettermanage expense processes, you fall into one of two categories:
• You either have a defined travel and expense policy, but have difficulty finding efficient and reli-able ways to enforce it, or
• You don’t have a travel and expense policy yet and need help establishing controls
With ExpenseWatch.com Expense Reports, everything is automated, from expense report creationthrough to reimbursement, reducing or eliminating the need for paper.
No matter what your company role —Submitter, Approver or Finance/Executive—ExpenseWatch.comallows you to work more efficiently. Submitters can download business expenses from credit cards andtravel management programs onto their expense reports and easily create a new report or add expenseitems and receipt images to existing expense reports directly from their smartphones.
Approvers automatically receive emails alerting them that reports have been submitted and are await-ing review. They are provided with all of the information they need in one place to approve or reject theentire report or individual line items, sending the approved reports through the system and rejecteditems back to submitters to re-work.
As expense reports are created, your specific internal spending policies and controls are automaticallyenforced. Finance and executives gain complete visibility into expense report spending—what’s beenpaid, and expense reports waiting to be approved or paid – providing real-time visibility to the impactspending will have on your bottom line. To ensure transactional efficiency, ExpenseWatch.com’s openspend management solution provides you with the flexibility to integrate spending data with a widerange of the business applications you use. From budgeting information imported into the systemthrough to payments via ACH, reimbursements through payroll systems, and posting approved transac-tions into your accounting or ERP system, ExpenseWatch.com enables you to create an end-to-endsystem to control, reduce and report on all company spending.
ExpenseWatch.com620 W. Germantown Pike, Suite 175Plymouth Meeting, PA 194621-866-399-2824
General Information & Sales Inquiries:[email protected]
Partnerships:[email protected]
ExpenseWatch.com is by your side with implementation, training and support for all users to ensureyour success. All of this capability is available for one low annual subscription. In fact, our pricingincents you to use us -- the more your company controls expenses with ExpenseWatch.com, the biggerthe return on your investment.
We invite you to learn how ExpenseWatch.com empowers you to spend with confidence.
Key Features:
Submitters:Mobile Apps; integrated travel booking data and credit card charges; drag and drop
to create expense items; easy receipt attachment (phone, fax, email); visual policy queues.
Approvers: Empowered approver inbox and detailed review – everything provided in one place
for approvers to make educated, intelligent approval decisions.
Financial Reviewers: integration with accounting, payroll, and ACH for reimbursement;
adjust reports as needed; easily separate reports for reimbursement: company-paid vs. submitter.
Administrators: credit card administration; flexible approval configurations; unlimited
categories with unlimited attributes; flexible policy configuration; alternate expense limits based
upon company role; use taxes.
Finance/Executives: Aggregate analysis of information; predefined and optional custom
reports; detailed visibility to transactions and documentation.
Comprehensive: Expense Reports is one of three modules offered through
ExpenseWatch.com’s integrated spend management system, along with Purchasing and Payable
Invoices. By automating expense reporting processes with ExpenseWatch.com, you gain complete
visibility and control over expense spending and are empowered to spend with confidence.
Customers
AbeBooks
American Medical Technologies
Copart
Delta Dental
EducationDynamics
Miami Dade County
Santa Rosa Consulting
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Gaming Laboratories International
Solairus Aviation
TM Forum
Trius Therapeutics
Wycliffe Bible Translators
Trinity Health
Walt Disney Company
Key LinksFree trial: http://www.empiresaas.com/login
Products: http://www.empiresaas.com/about/products
Company Profile
WSG has been in business since 1984 and our entire business is focused on the development of
timesheet and expense management software. In 1992 we added on billing, project financial accounting
and resource scheduling software which is designed for project-based environments. We have over
75,000 users in over 40 countries worldwide.
WSG is proud of the quality of our offerings, customer support and product capabilities. Our
enterprise software, Empire SUITE, is designed for growing, dynamic companies. A key difference
between the Empire SUITE and competitive products is the ease and speed of deployment. In fact, two
of the critical factors in a competitive win were the significantly shorter implementation time frame and
lower implementation costs for our solution compared to the other tools under consideration. Another
major differentiator of the Empire SUITE is that once you have configured the software to meet your
needs, any future changes in business requirements will not make your investment obsolete. Some soft-
ware companies use “scalability” as the ability to accommodate an increasing number of users. We use
scalability to mean both accommodating user growth and that the Empire SUITE will grow with the
organization functionally to meet evolving business challenges.
We are also very proud to have a version of our worldwide tested enterprise version in the software as
service offering, EmpireSUITE. Based on the enterprise version, uniquely designed and developed for
ease of use and simplistic administration, but under the hood, strong enough and configurable for small
to midsized firms. Users can manage prospects, opportunities, activities, projects, time and expense and
billing, all conveniently accessible via an internet browser or mobile smart phone.
Key Features
Supports time and expense data entry using web-based software, our Empire MOBILE application,and through our Empire CALENDAR add-in to Microsoft Outlook.
Auto-population of timesheets with scheduled work, personal time off and holidays.
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WSG Systems Corpc/o Steve Macquade393 Fifth Avenue, 8th FloorNew York, NY 10016212-381-0434 Direct212-675-2898 [email protected]: steve.macquade
Email notifications for time and expense sheets including those due, rejected and/or late.
Configurable automated rule/policy checking on time and expense submissions.
Electronic submission of time and expenses, including scanned expense receipts.
Captures expenses in incurred currency, converts to employee reimbursement currency and into theproject’s contract currency.
System can be configured to capture and process VAT information through billing and reclamation.
Employee time off module available.
Integration with financial and human resources systems.
Empire TIME is easily customizable to meet your complex business requirements and can be quicklyimplemented for both on-site and hosted solutions.
Customers:
Atlantis Healthcare
Deloitte
Gabriel Roeder Smith & Company
Guidewire
Independent Catalyst
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Key Links:Solutions: http://www.interplx.com/expense-management/
Services: http://www.interplx.com/expense-management-services/
Case Studies: http://www.interplx.com/case-studies/fortune-100-company/
http://www.interplx.com/case-studies/case-studies-consumer/
http://www.interplx.com/case-studies/case-studies-charming/
Company Profile:
At InterplX, we provide business expense management solutions through a unique offering that com-
bines our proprietary ExpenseNet® expense automation software and back-office services. In fact, we
are the only company that offers the total business expense management solution – from the receipt
submission through expense audit, payment processing and expense reimbursement, archiving and dis-
crepancy resolution.
Known for providing highly customized implementations, InterplX has consistently delighted its
clients by helping them strengthen controls, reduce costs, improve employee satisfaction, and minimize
the burden on internal resources.
Over the years, we have established ourselves as a leader in the expense management industry, serving
an ever-expanding client base across North America – including many Fortune 500 clients. In doing so,
we have taken great care to develop strong, dedicated, and mutually beneficial industry partnerships.
Key Features:
Flexibility – Our goal is to offer the maximum amount configurability to meet each of our client’sunique needs, regardless of size or type of business.
Compliance – Our automated expense report software and back-office services have passed therigorous SSAE 16 (formerly SAS 70 Type II) review, a requirement for Sarbanes Oxley (SOX) compli-ance.
Value –We charge based on volume and level of service provided. We do not make you pay a largemonthly minimum regardless of how many expense reports you process.
Mobile App – Our approach is device agnostic. In addition to our cloud solutions, we provide amobile-optimized site that works with any browser-enabled smart phone or tablet.
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InterplX Inc.1157 Valley Park Drive, Suite 115Shakopee, MN [email protected]
Booking Integration –We integrate with any booking tool you choose and provide booked versusactual comparison after the fact. By comparing booked data from your travel management companywith actual expense data, we are able to identify travelers and organizations that are not bookingaccording to prescribed procedures without burdening all of your travelers.
Audit Services – Our audit services are completed by internal resources and are tailored to yourselection criteria. We also make two attempts to resolve any discrepancies before burdening yourresources.
Reimbursement Services –We reimburse 2-3 days, which faster than most of the competition.We also support direct payment to card providers and we manage the exceptions (rejections, rever-sals, etc.) so that you don’t have to.
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