Emburse Study Highlights Pandemic Impact on Expense Management

Added cost and complexity drives need for automation

LOS ANGELES & PORTLAND, Maine--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Emburse, a global leader in expense and AP automation solutions, today launched its latest Travel & Expense Management Trends Report. This year’s report details how organizations are managing spend as they emerge from the pandemic.

In a year when cash flow and cost control became top priorities, organizations sought to rein in existing expenses while encountering new ones. Of the 515 finance managers surveyed, almost half (49 percent) reviewed supplier payment terms last year in an effort to reduce costs. But 41 percent said their duty of care costs would increase as a result of the pandemic and 40 percent expect regulatory expenditure to go up.

Unfortunately, many companies are not set up to effectively manage and optimize their spending. The study showed that a third of organizations are still processing expenses manually with pen and paper, spreadsheets or homegrown systems. The result is slow and expensive reimbursement processes: 35 percent don’t know the cost of processing an expense claim and 33 percent take a week or more to reimburse it, leaving employees out-of-pocket. Driving all this inefficiency are errors, lost receipts and delayed expense submissions.

“The pandemic accelerated the digitization of many functions but organizations still have a long way to go to make their expense management truly efficient,” said Eric Friedrichsen, CEO at Emburse. “Meantime, they’re missing valuable opportunities to improve cash flow and create a more positive employee experience by eliminating delays and frustrations.”

The report provides a blueprint for organizations looking to achieve similar efficiencies. For example, it recommends ensuring employees understand expense policies, benchmarking your processes, implementing smart controls and automation and insisting on full visibility of expenditure by integrating systems.

To read the findings, download a copy of the report at www.emburse.com/learn.

About The Travel & Expense Management Trends Report
The Travel & Expense Management Trends Report was conducted in January 2021. Emburse surveyed 515 finance professionals outside of its customer base.

About Emburse
Emburse humanizes work by empowering business travelers, finance professionals, and CFOs to eliminate manual, time-consuming tasks so they can focus on what matters most.

Emburse offers a growing portfolio of award-winning expense and AP automation solutions, including Emburse Abacus, Emburse Captio, Emburse Certify, Emburse Chrome River, Emburse Cards, Emburse Nexonia, Emburse SpringAhead and Emburse Tallie. Its innovative offerings are tailored to meet the unique needs of specific industries, company sizes, and geographies, and are trusted by more than 9 million users in more than 120 countries. Over 16,000 customers, from start-ups to global enterprises, including Boot Barn, Grant Thornton, Telefónica, Lufthansa Systems, and Toyota, rely on Emburse to eliminate manual processes, make faster, smarter decisions, and help make users’ lives - and their businesses - better.

Emburse is recognized as a leader in expense management and accounts payable automation by analyst firm IDC, and has received multiple awards for its high levels of customer satisfaction.

For more information on Emburse, visit emburse.com, call 877-EMBURSE, or follow the organization’s social channels at @emburse.