Tag Archives: TEM

Transparent, Connected, Effortless: Concur Fusion 2014

Steve Singh is the founder and CEO at Concur, a globally recognized travel expense solution provider. PayStream had the opportunity to connect with Steve as well has his brother, co-founder and President, Raj Singh, at the Concur Fusion user summit in New Orleans a couple weeks ago. He opened the session with a broad summary of the goals that Concur is striving towards. While Concur’s goals are grand, the company is optimistic about obtaining them, though fully aware that the level of perfection they wish to attain takes time and effort. Concur would like to see every company in the world eventually use Concur to process their travel expenses. At first may seem a bit lofty given the growing maturity of the TEM market. However, when you see the passion and dedication that Steve and Raj have about reinventing the corporate travel supply chain, it begins to seem a bit more plausible.

The Singh brothers started the company 21 years ago based on the concept of diminishing the pain of filling out expense reports. The nature of their company has fully become about making a difference in their customer’s lives, and they see the creation of an open global platform essential to this process.

Ultimately, Concur’s mission is to create the “Perfect Trip” for each one of their customers, each time they travel. For Steve, the perfect trip revolves very much around the ease with which he can connect to his personal life while carrying on his professional life. He illustrates the possibilities of such easy travel with episodes from his own business trips, such as how he can send his sister a gift or connect with his children for their nightly FaceTime with only a few clicks on his phone. For Steve, the effortlessness with which he is able to complete these tasks is inspiring. He wants Concur to be that intuitive with features so streamlined that they seem to work like magic. “Here’s what’s not visible in those clicks,” he says, “it takes an open and connected platform to make all that magic happen….We have an opportunity, here at Concur, to make business travel that magical.”

A magical travel experience starts with a simple concept: the innovation of a global travel community. Companies today succeed by recognizing that great corporate travel can only happen by the collaboration and connection of global communities and platforms. This connection means tailoring to a customer’s personal preferences and a company’s specific needs in integrating with travel suppliers. Certain obstacles prohibit full integration, (Steve reports that on average, 45% of their customers travel expenses are not automatically imported into Concur’s platform), but Concur is determined to reach that 100% connection. “As we collaborate, we will move our industry forward, and that is beautiful….”

During his keynote, Rajeev summarizes successful integration with three interlinking and interchangeable words: transparent, connected, and effortless. For him, these words are simple descriptions of a company’s inherent rights. When Concur’s applications are available and properly utilized, these rights are upheld. When a company has full transparency, they should be able to see where and how their money is being spent, as well as how effectively budgets are being kept. When a company is connected, communication with their employees should be easy and accessible, and sharing information should be almost instantaneous. When a company’s trips are effortless, each stage of the journey (from the airport to the hotel and everywhere in between) should progress smoothly according to both the company’s procedures and the employee’s personal preferences.

Concur’s belief is that for transparency, connectedness, and effortlessness to combine effectively, there must be an open global platform and a healthy global ecosystem that allows for wider connection and easier movement around the world. However, this is not only desirable to bring about the “Perfect Trip”. According to Rajeev, this idea of an ecosystem is fundamentally about empowering the rest of the world.

2014 TEM Report: Profound Growth in Use of Automation

PayStream Advisors has recently published our 2014 Travel and Expense Management (TEM) report and we’re excited to share with you what we’ve found. Manual data entry continues to rank as the number one challenge that organizations face in the expense management process. PayStream expects this challenge to fizzle away as the use of automated solutions continues to rise—Fifty-five percent of our survey respondents reported using a fully automated solution as their method of submitting expense reports (See figure below). We’ve also noticed over the last three years, the number of organizations using inter-office mail to submit reports and receipts has dropped from 37 to 30 percent.

One finding that should be of particular interest to organizations with a high level of employee mobility is the difference in average costs between survey respondents using fully automated, partially automated, and manual expense report submission methods. The difference between the averages of fully automated and manual reports was calculated to be $12.58. Considering close to 10 percent of respondents also reported to process more than 5,000 expense reports per month—this can be a six-figure difference in costs and therefore a huge opportunity for savings.

Modern TEM solutions continue to advance with groundbreaking mobile applications that make scanning images and populating and submitting reports easier than ever. These allow employees to focus on more important matters at hand such as pleasing a client, attaining a sale, or discussing partnerships. Several leading TEM solution providers helped fund this research and can be found in the latter half of the report. PayStream welcomes you to download a free copy of the report here.

A Vital Tool for Travel and Expense Management

Investing in a Travel and Expense Management solution (TEM) will increase revenues by decreasing the costs associated with expense reporting, improve expenditure visibility, and provide the necessary tools to manage spending processes that are efficient and effortless.

Concur, a leading provider of integrated TEM solutions, helps companies control costs and save valuable time through their cloud and mobile systems. Concur’s open platform enables an entire travel and expense organization of customers, suppliers, and developers to access and utilize Concur’s T&E cloud. The system quickly adapts to individual employee preferences and is individually tailored to meet the needs of companies large and small throughout the world.

Concur is a pioneer of cloud computing and is the only solution in the market that combines travel, itinerary and expense management into one integrated and easy-to-use solution. Concur’s solution follows robust business rules combined with automated travel requests or pre-trip approvals to ensure consistent travel policy enforcement. This practice puts organizations in complete control of their corporate expense system. Concur’s service helps companies enforce their T&E policies every step of the way – before booking, during the trip and when expenses are submitted and approved by including customized spending limits, preferred vendors, and a customized rules engine.

Concur travel booking is integrated directly into one seamless TEM process and connects to all major global distribution services, as well as directly with thousands of suppliers, enabling all bookings (hotel, flight, rail and ground transportation) to be completed without the aid of a travel agent. Concur’s solution enables users to drill down on specific hotel amenities such as the inclusion of a fitness room or pool, similar to popular online travel booking sites. Concur’s TEM services are designed with resilience and availability in mind. Their mobile platform not only allows users to log on through any web browser, but also allows users to access the solution directly from an optimized mobile application. This allows all users: employees, approvers, and auditors to use the application from virtually anywhere.

Concur’s process for submitting expense reports and receipts is done quickly and easily through the capture of e-receipts directly from travel providers. E-receipts include detailed folio data and are automatically uploaded into a traveler’s expense report. This time-saving process delivers actionable data that, in combination with the corporate card transaction information, provides an unprecedented view into every expense transaction. In the instances where e-receipts are not available, receipts can be submitted via email, fax, or using the Concur mobile application and the device’s camera.

Concur’s built-in workflow and audit rules allow managers to quickly and easily approve in-policy expenses. Concur’s service integrates seamlessly with virtually every back-office system, from enterprise-wide ERP systems to smaller and even home-grown back-office processes. With over 15,000 clients of all types, there likely isn’t a back-office configuration that Concur hasn’t worked with.

To learn more about Concur’s T&E Cloud ecosystem, download a complimentary copy of PayStream’s 2013 Travel and Expense Benchmark report. The report includes a detailed Concur profile and case study. Stay tuned for the upcoming 2014 TEM report that PayStream will publish in March.

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