The growing reliance of companies on expense management systems has set a trend in the industry. Its efficient functioning and its capacity to minimise human effort and paper wastage has added to its popularity. This has caused the companies to seriously look into the importance and the benefits of owning an extensive expense management application. The market has been flooded with various types of expense management systems capable of performing multiple management tasks which has led to an increased state of confusion among the companies that are now switching from traditional modes of expense process to the automated ones. If you are looking to explore an expense management system for the first time or you are planning to change from or update an existing system, you might want to look into some of the factors that you might want to consider before finally choosing an expense management system for your company.
€ It is read as automated processing directly implying minimal manual processing. This eliminates or at least drastically minimises inefficiency and inaccuracy in data entry. This also reduces the delay in reimbursement and also maintains a record of the finances for reference at a later stage. The system should allow online entry by the employee and online approval by the manager and the finance department.
€ An efficient expense management system should also encourage compliance of the company policies at every stage. The software should stringently follow the travel policy as dictated by the company. This ensures that the employees adhere to the travel policy, thus bring stability to the company spending. The application should also raise an alert automatically if it detects any out-of-policy spend.
€ Complete transparency of the company spends should be achieved with an expense management system. Every company processes expenses in different areas. Card expenses, cash expenses, voucher expenses, mobile expenses, travel expenses etc are all processed in different location. Hence it becomes difficult to get an accurate account for each employee. A good expense management system unifies all the transactions, irrespective of the source. It should all be made available on a single platform and easily accessible for future verification.
€ Compatibility check, of course, is very important. Chances are that you will be investing a good sum into the system. Ensure that the system is compatible with all your existing business systems as well. That way, you can connect it with the other systems and automate even the reimbursement process.
€ Run a quick calculation on cost of processing expense claims if it is done manually. Ensure that you run the test for high value and low value expenses. If the expenses are significant, you will have to consider automating the entire process. If not, you can test the waters by buying an expense management system with just the basic components. You can update the software with time when you feel the need for complete automation.
€ An expense management system is a way for your company to reduce expenditure. The software itself should not leave the company in a state of financial distress. Check the market for the software, double check the software features, and make an informed call.
€ User-friendly software is in great demand these days. The point of the system is to make the task of finance management easy, less time consuming and less distressing. This ideal cannot be fulfilled if figuring out the software's user interface is a herculean task in itself.
€ The software should take into account the tax deductions and must have the facility to adjust the variable according to the differing scenarios. This will eliminate the task of manually entering the percentages for every expense.
€ Security is also one of the important criteria to consider while selecting the management system. Check for security levels with international clearance. Since it is handles such an important sector of your company, ensure that you do not leave yourself vulnerable to external threats and possible data loss.
The above mentioned pointers will help you narrow down your list of choices. Other factors also have to be considered depending on your business and any other specific requirement you may have.
€ It is read as automated processing directly implying minimal manual processing. This eliminates or at least drastically minimises inefficiency and inaccuracy in data entry. This also reduces the delay in reimbursement and also maintains a record of the finances for reference at a later stage. The system should allow online entry by the employee and online approval by the manager and the finance department.
€ An efficient expense management system should also encourage compliance of the company policies at every stage. The software should stringently follow the travel policy as dictated by the company. This ensures that the employees adhere to the travel policy, thus bring stability to the company spending. The application should also raise an alert automatically if it detects any out-of-policy spend.
€ Complete transparency of the company spends should be achieved with an expense management system. Every company processes expenses in different areas. Card expenses, cash expenses, voucher expenses, mobile expenses, travel expenses etc are all processed in different location. Hence it becomes difficult to get an accurate account for each employee. A good expense management system unifies all the transactions, irrespective of the source. It should all be made available on a single platform and easily accessible for future verification.
€ Compatibility check, of course, is very important. Chances are that you will be investing a good sum into the system. Ensure that the system is compatible with all your existing business systems as well. That way, you can connect it with the other systems and automate even the reimbursement process.
€ Run a quick calculation on cost of processing expense claims if it is done manually. Ensure that you run the test for high value and low value expenses. If the expenses are significant, you will have to consider automating the entire process. If not, you can test the waters by buying an expense management system with just the basic components. You can update the software with time when you feel the need for complete automation.
€ An expense management system is a way for your company to reduce expenditure. The software itself should not leave the company in a state of financial distress. Check the market for the software, double check the software features, and make an informed call.
€ User-friendly software is in great demand these days. The point of the system is to make the task of finance management easy, less time consuming and less distressing. This ideal cannot be fulfilled if figuring out the software's user interface is a herculean task in itself.
€ The software should take into account the tax deductions and must have the facility to adjust the variable according to the differing scenarios. This will eliminate the task of manually entering the percentages for every expense.
€ Security is also one of the important criteria to consider while selecting the management system. Check for security levels with international clearance. Since it is handles such an important sector of your company, ensure that you do not leave yourself vulnerable to external threats and possible data loss.
The above mentioned pointers will help you narrow down your list of choices. Other factors also have to be considered depending on your business and any other specific requirement you may have.
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