Featured Apps - Managing Staff Expenses: Why choose an expense App?

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Covid-19 has provided a painful demonstration of the damaging impact that an unexpected event can have on cashflow, particularly for those businesses that are not prepared.

Bulk submission of employee expenses can also have an impact on cash flow. Imagine all employees digging out all their expense receipts at once! When expenses are submitted infrequently, and in large volumes, there is often less control and review of the expenditure.

With the use of a mobile app, employees are likely to file their expenses more frequently, giving better visibility of your cash position. Automating the process means staff can spend more time on generating revenue instead of internal tasks.

A wealth of expense software companies have entered the App market but here are few of the most popular

Xero Expenses

Xero’s upgraded expenses add-on has Optical Character Recognition (OCR) that allows employees to scan and submit expenses and mileage claims on the go. Employers save time and can reimburse employees’ claims promptly with smart reconciliation and they can monitor spending in real-time.

Controls dictate who can submit and approve expense claims, and bills are automatically produced when the expense is approved.

This is a Xero offering and therefore, as you’d expect, it seamlessly integrates with Xero Bills, Contacts, Accounts, Tracking Categories, Projects, Users, Currencies, and feeds transactions straight into the ledger. Xero learns over time to auto-code expenses into the right category.

Expensify

In many ways the benchmark in expenses apps, Expensify Smart Scans receipts using the mobile app, and OCR technology automatically reads and codes the receipt details for you, then adds the receipt to an expense report that can be automatically submitted and approved. They have created an app which will automate much of the expense process, this means less paperwork and faster results in terms of tracking and processing expense claims. Reporting is straightforward, with the ability to customise many of the features.

Advanced features include the ability to tag other employees in expenses, tag customers in entertaining receipts, and the ability to set different approvers based on the amount of the claim.

Autoentry

AutoEntry is an indispensable bookkeeping tool that uses optical character recognition to extract information from emailed, scanned, or photographed invoices and statements. It also offers an expenses function using the same technology. Staff can scan invoices using the mobile app and upload them to populate an expense claim for approval by a user with the necessary permissions. Whilst AutoEntry lacks some of the features of the specialist expense apps, its OCR technology and accuracy are second to none. If you are already using the software for entering purchase invoices (and if not, you really should be!) then it is a good low-cost option for managing those simple expense claims too.

Pleo

One of our recommended app partners, Pleo offer smart company cards that automate expense reports and simplify company spending, solving the problem of lost receipts and tedious paperwork, and providing a low-cost replacement for company credit cards and petty cash.

Staff, contractors, or departments can be assigned cards with individualised credit limits and spending restrictions, and each spend on the card sends a reminder to the user to upload an image of the receipt for the item they have just purchased.

A real-time dashboard gives full visibility of company spending in real-time, and integrations with accounting software allow easy reconciliation, negating the need for repetitive manual data entry and processes often faced by finance departments.

Pleo have expanded their offering considerably in the past year and now offer free optical character recognition software for the entry and approval of all purchase invoices, as well as an open banking solution for paying multiple suppliers without incurring additional bank charges.