How Does Expense Management Software Help Control Travel Costs?
This software aids in the management of all employee expenses, such as taking out corporate meals to take a client out to dinner or taking an early morning flight to get to work. With so many companies having employees travel daily, there is enough waste in the travel without adding even more to the bottom line by inefficient expense management.
If you spend money on travel expense management software it will help you manage your company travel and reduce the cost. Business travel accounts have so many categories to choose from, such as expense reports for individual workers, expense reports for the entire company, or if you need to keep track of individual company travel expenses for billing purposes. Expense reports help you manage and monitor employee travel and mileage expenditures.
When using expense management software for small businesses, you want to make sure you get all the information within your control. Expense reports should include everything from the date the item was purchased, to who ordered it, what the item is, the exact dollar value, and the date it was shipped.
This makes it easier for you to determine where any overage expenses came from. Tracking these items will allow you to quickly eliminate or reduce wasteful spending to make sure you’re only putting your company’s capital towards what is necessary.
E-Commerce stores often use cloud-based expense management software for better organization. Cloud-based management eliminates many of the hassles that come with using paper checks. With e-commerce, a business can print their receipts when they have taken authorization from the customer.
Instead of going to your local cashier for a check, the customer fills out an electronic order on your website and sends it through a payment gateway to you. When the order is processed, you print the receipt, attach it to an invoice and send it to your customer. You never have to print a check again.
Small businesses can benefit greatly from expense management software, as well. Your company policies can be accessed through a secure remote connection, allowing you to quickly identify any erroneous, incomplete, or old data. You can then take action to correct them, which will reduce unnecessary employee time that would have been spent searching for lost data. Expense policies can also be monitored remotely from your office or home if you choose to use an internet-based service.
Another type of expense management software is called expense reimbursement management. With expense reimbursement management, you can determine exactly how much your employees are eligible to claim under your company policy and then determine how much you need to reimburse your employees for any claim that they make.
This is a great way to ensure you’re not wasting money on excessive claim amounts or excessive claims made by employees. Employees who get detailed reimbursement information from your expense reimbursement policy often claim less than they may have otherwise. If you have an accurate policy in place, you will also find that fewer employees will accept leave without first finding out how much they will be receiving under your policy.
Sometimes, companies may need an expense management software solution to help them manage travel expenses. When an employee travels outside of the company for business purposes, there can be separate expense reports for the employee’s travel and business travel. For example, if an employee uses his or her vehicle for business travel, but reimburses that expense at work, it may appear as if the employee is personally reimbursing the travel, when in fact, his or her company is paying for that travel.
An expense management solution can help you manage these types of travel expenses in a way that ensures your company is only paying for what it is worth. You can tailor your policy so that it only pays for actual expenses, eliminates any ‘wear and tear’ fees, and provides a line-by-line breakdown so you can determine which employee’s claim is eligible and which one isn’t. This can help ensure you spend your company’s money wisely when travel is involved.
There are many different aspects to expense management of data in general. Small businesses need to keep track of more expenses than larger businesses, and since the majority of small businesses are usually family-owned operations, it can be difficult to spend the time needed to effectively manage employee records. When you use an expense management software solution, you can streamline the record-keeping process and eliminate the errors that come with manual record-keeping.
You can also utilize the software to generate reports that allow you to track each employee’s expenses and keep all of your records organized. If you have questions about how your small business can benefit from using expense management software, contact a solution provider today.
