CERTIFY // 01 6 REASONS TO SWITCH TO CLOUD-BASED EXPENSE MANAGEMENT
6 Reasons to Switch To Cloud-Based Expense Management Contents 03 03 04 04 05 05 06 Introduction Cloud-based expense management allows access from anywhere Gain better insight into spending with on-demand analytics Enforce travel and expense policies more diligently Speed up reimbursement times significantly Operations will become scalable and global Eliminate paper receipts entirely CERTIFY // 02
6 Reasons to Switch To Cloud-Based Expense Management Introduction Many businesses have begun to realize the extent of the benefits offered to them by automated expense management. These programs which allow expense information to be stored digitally and expense reports to be generated automatically are about to become standard across all sectors of industry. That s because costs are rising every day for such organizations. The Aberdeen Group recently reported that the average company currently spends 10 percent or more of its annual budget on business travel expenses. As a result, there s no longer any reason to waste time entering data into or analyzing information from Excel spreadsheets or worse yet, to and from pen-and-paper expense reports. By offering Certify programs to both accountants and employees, business owners can increase productivity by a significant degree. Below are six reasons why cloud-based expense management can benefit companies. 1 Cloud-based expense management allows access from anywhere The most obvious benefit offered by cloud-based expense reporting and by any sort of cloud-based services is the ability to access information anywhere. When an employee uses Certify, it doesn t matter if they re working from home, traveling on a business trip or working from the office. They ll be able to access their expense-related information with ease. Businesses are quickly realizing how much more efficient such a practice can make them. In fact, the Aberdeen Group recently reported that organizations who use web-based expense solutions dedicate 83 percent less funds to expense-processing costs than companies who do not use web-based expense solutions. CERTIFY // 03
2 Gain better insight into spending with on-demand analytics Certify allows employees to digitize their expense reports, and complete them with a few clicks, which makes expense reporting more convenient. But, it also allows managers to better understand where the money spent on behalf of their businesses is actually going. The program allows individuals to conduct audits on each employee automatically, which is a massive improvement from the random, sample-sized audits conducted by businesses that make use of manual expense management techniques. The program will even allow managers and accountants to study spending tendencies separated by departments, employees, expense types or any other number of categories. There are more than 50 kinds of category-based expense reports available to managers as soon as they swap their expense reporting systems to the cloud-based program offered by Certify. 3 Enforce travel and expense policies more diligently Certify will prompt accountants and company managers to input both their hard and soft travel and expense policies as soon as they begin using the program. Employees are then prompted whenever one of their expenses exceeds the limits dictated by the policies, allowing them to alter or rescind their request for reimbursement before the report ever reaches the accounting team. A literal red flag is raised in a digital expense report next to any cost that is not in line with the limits set by your company. Employees will no longer file reports against policy, and accountants will no longer have to make reimbursements for or rectify such claims saving both time and money for any business that makes use of cloudbased expense management. The Aberdeen Group has even found that businesses using web-based expense management tools see the rate of compliance with their spending policies increase by more than 40 percent. CERTIFY // 04
4 Speed up reimbursement times significantly Cloud-based expense management allows employees to receive their reimbursements faster than ever before. Certify s ACH service sends an email to your company treasurer as soon as reports are filed. He or she then logs in, views the reports and authorizes payments. Reimbursements can even be held or delayed if necessary, but if not, employees will receive email notifications regarding their funds transfers the same day that the treasurer authorizes their reports. This helps to cut down significantly on the amount spent by your business per expense report. Organizations that use web-based expense management tools spend approximately $7 to process each expense report, according to the Aberdeen Group. Organizations would do so manually, however, can find themselves paying more than $40 per report, on average. Before the Pharmacists Mutual Insurance Company implemented the use of Certify, for example, it took between seven and 10 days to approve expense reports, followed by another seven days to process expenses. Now that the company has begun to used cloud-based software, reports and approved and employees are reimbursed in five days or less. 5 Operations will become scalable and global Certify is programmed to accept information regarding 120 different currencies, and can be translated into more than 60 different languages. Employees have access to their expense reports from all different points in the world, and they ll be able to translate information into their preferred language, as well. CERTIFY // 05
6 Eliminate paper receipts entirely Once a business starts to make use of Certify, it ll find itself saving money on all kinds of paper-related resources. Employees won t need to file their paper receipts, monthly expense reports will never need to be printed and no related information will ever need to be sent to another office. In fact, more than 90 percent of all Certify clients have been able to completely eliminate the use of spreadsheets once they ve implemented our technology. So whether it s by reducing the amount of mail posted or space taken up by documents, the all-digital design of Certify helps businesses cut down on their resource budgets. Costs related to expense reporting can save a business up to 60 percent of its related budget. Employees will save hours every month thanks to use of the Certify program, managers will save comparable time by not needing to manually reconcile data and your company will save large amounts of money thanks to the reduced time spent by employees on expense tracking. One company that makes use of Certify, VitaPlus, found that its expense management budget decreased by more than 50 percent after they switched from manual reporting methods. Once switched to cloudbased expense management, every department and employee in a given business will find themselves working at a more productive level than they ever have before and that will help to bring costs lower than ever before. CERTIFY // 06
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