Some businesses fail to see the benefits of travel expense management. They feel that their employees are on the straight and narrow and don’t believe they need to spend any time or effort dealing with travel expense reports. Some of these businesses believe they are too small to benefit from this kind of expense report automation, but no business can afford to ignore any potential area where money or time might be lost.

Benefit #1: Avert Employee Fraud

One of the benefits to travel expense management comes when a company sets up a standard travel expense policy and passes that policy along to its employees and management team. By spelling everything out completely, there can be little chance of an individual misunderstanding what expenses are allowable and what expenses are not. It’s important to revisit travel expense policies on a regular basis.

It should come as no shock to anyone in business that 15 percent of all corporate fraud is linked to bogus travel and expense reports. There are a number of different ways that employees can attempt to scam the company, and one of the benefits to travel expense management is providing businesses with a way to have an early detection system in place designed to prevent fraud.

There are some businesses that assume only large corporations deal with travel expense fraud. Nothing could be further from the truth. Small companies often have to deal with employees who submit false expense reports that are backed by false receipts. With today's technology, it's very easy to create a false receipt.

Benefit #2: Accountability During an Audit

Another benefit to travel expense management becomes evident in the event of an audit. Being able to account for every travel and business expense makes it a great deal easier to handle auditors. Some of the software on the market notifies the employee when they might be claiming something erroneously as a valid expense. The company can literally tell the travel expense management software which expenses are allowable and which ones are not based on the company's travel expense policies.

Benefit #3: Ability to Quickly Gather Detailed Expense Data

When it comes time to file tax returns, a benefit to travel expense management software is the ability to gather detailed expense data without the need to spend a lot of time. It's important to be able to gather this information quickly and accurately, and to have details at your fingertips if needed.

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Our choice of Chrome River EXPENSE was made in part due to the very user-friendly interface, easy configurability, and the clear commitment to impactful customer service – all aspects in which Chrome River was the clear winner. While Chrome River is not as large as some of the other vendors we considered, we found that to be a benefit and our due diligence showed that it could support us as well as any large players in the space, along with a personalized level of customer care. Sally Abella, Director of Corporate Travel Harman International
We are excited to be able to enforce much more stringent compliance to our expense guidelines and significantly enhance our expense reporting and analytics. By automating these processes, we will be able to free up AP time formerly spent on manual administrative tasks, and enhance the role by being much more strategic. Ben Zastrow Zelle
Expense Policy Template - Download our free template.

Expense Policy Template

Download our free template.

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