It is no secret that it's becoming increasingly necessary for organisations to have tighter control and policies around travel and entertainment (T&E) spending. If the financial crisis taught us anything, it's that corporate travel budgets are one of the first areas of spending cut during financial hardship - making it more important than ever to maximise efficiency. And, we see what happens when organisations don't have a proper T&E management process in place - the recent MP expense scandal comes to mind. But, what does this all mean for the average organisation and how they manage this process?

To better understand current travel and entertainment (T&E) expense processes, Concur surveyed close to 300 expense and travel professionals in December 2009. This survey focused on how British organisations are managing T&E and the general sentiment surrounding automation in this area of business spend.

Profile of organisations surveyed
Concur surveyed a mix of small and large companies across various industries. A large percentage of survey participants (35%) are financial directors or controllers within their organisations, with the remainder being across finance/procurement and travel departments. Across the board, the typical yearly T&E spend for these organisations is less than £700,000.

The majority of organisations surveyed are processing less than 100 expense claims on a monthly basis, and predictably, this number increased as the employee size grew. However, interestingly enough, we found that there were a small percentage of companies with under 499 employees who had 500-1000 expense claims per month (4%).

Top Tip: The number of employees in an organisation isn't the primary factor for deciding if an expense and travel process makes sense. The number of expense claims processed on a monthly basis is a stronger indicator.

The travel procurement process
Through the survey, we learned that 36% of organisations with under 499 employees used a consumer booking tool to procure their company travel. Conversely, only 10% of organisations with over 1,000 employees used a consumer tool. Our experience has shown that the advantages of moving from a consumer to a business travel agent and having a professional expense and travel management tool is twofold.

First of all, you are safe in the knowledge you are performing your "duty of care" to your employees and that you can easily locate and help them when the unexpected happens (like volcanic eruptions). Secondly, the robust reporting provided by the booking tool helps you analyse your spend patterns. For example, if your travellers are using a specific hotel regularly, you can go back to the supplier armed with spend data to negotiate better rates for your organisation.
The number of employees in an organisation isn't the primary factor for deciding if an expense and travel process makes sense. The number of expense claims processed on a monthly basis is a stronger indicator

Top Tip: Investigate a corporate travel option if you don't currently have one in place. Ask a travel management company (TMC) to show you specific information on the benefits of a corporate travel programme for smaller companies.

The expense claim process
The survey told us that expense claim management is mainly a manual process - only 45% of respondents had any kind of automated tool in place. For organisations that use consumer booking tools for their travel management, this figure rose dramatically to 81% having a manual expense process. When considering the expense and travel management process, 39% of respondents were mostly concerned with using this as an area for cost cutting. While 27% were worried about their inefficient processes and 13% were concerned about capturing tax data. We saw that another 13% of respondents were concerned with poor reporting and only seven percent were worried about fraud.

Top Tip: Investing in an end-to-end travel and expense management solution has many advantages, which include cost savings, increased visibility and control over T&E spend.

Conclusion
The results of the UK Travel Survey showed us that many organisations lack the necessary control and cost savings that automation brings to the management of T&E spend. By combining online travel booking with automated expense claim, end-to-end solutions help organisations manage the entire expense and travel management process through one service. In fact according to Aberdeen Group, best-in-class enterprises are 70% more likely than all other organisations to utilise an end-to-end solution. Industry research shows that companies that automate expense and travel management through one seamless solution enjoy best-in-class results, including:
  • Increased policy compliance by over 30%
  • Reduced expense reporting costs by 80%
  • Increased T&E spend visibility by over 58%
  • Significantly decreased processing, approval and reimbursement times
First steps
Determine if expense and travel automation would be beneficial for your organisation. Concur has helped companies of all sizes automate inefficient business processes. Based on our experience, our first three recommended steps are:

Step 1: Spend 15 minutes to determine if expense and travel automation makes sense for your organisation by comparing your own practices to industry best practices. See where the biggest gaps are, and what the potential savings and benefits could be. For example, use Aberdeen Group's State of T&E Expense Management Assessment Tool.

Step 2: Devote an additional 30-45 minutes, and see what you are missing out on. Attend a Webinar or see an online demo of an integrated expense and travel solution. See for yourself the soft, as well as, the hard benefits for your organisation - register for a Concur Webinar.

Step 3: Invest 30 minutes, and let Concur help you create your own business case - a blueprint for you to share to help you justify the investment and the return.

For more information please visit www.concur.co.uk or call us at +44 (0) 1753 501741