Binary Stream partners with Gorilla Expense to provide a fully integrated multi-entity management and AP automation solution for Dynamics 365 Business Central. Being a direct extension embedded into Dynamics 365 Business Central, this solution allows users to tap into the full capabilities of Multi-Entity Management while also giving them the power to automate invoicing and expense approvals all within the familiar Microsoft interface.
“We’re excited to expand our global presence with Gorilla Expense and look forward to seeing where the partnership takes us. The integration of our solutions has created a best-of-breed accounting solution for businesses that are struggling to manage multiple companies within Business Central,” says Sergio Kelly, Technical Product Manager at Binary Stream.
Companies can tap into 360-degree visibility of their entities with real-time consolidated reporting and centralized transaction processing in a secure environment. Also equipped with EU tax tools, automated invoicing, and an approval ap that means managers can make decisions on the go, preventing the build-up of approvals bottlenecks.
“This is an exciting development in the Dynamics space, and we look forward to working with Binary Stream on innovative solutions. Our collective goal is to make the Microsoft 365 Business Central environment work for our clients as they scale and grow,” says Kathleen Forsyth, Director, Channel Sales and Marketing at Gorilla Expense
To know more about Gorilla Expense’s integration with Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central visit our Dynamics 365 Business Central page. If you have any questions about the integration, please feel free to connect with sales@gorillaexpense.com and existing customers can write to support@gorillaexpense.com
Gorilla Expense makes travel and expense reporting a breeze with an easy, seamless, and scalable solution for businesses of all sizes. It provides smooth and automatic integration with Microsoft Dynamics GP. In fact, with Gorilla Expenses proprietary integration software, it all happens in just one click of a button. Read more
Gorilla Expense offers a robust and fully automated integration of credit card data into Dynamics GP. This is available for all versions of GP (GP10 and above). Using our proprietary Gorilla Expense Integration App, the AP Manager can import credit card transactions (or the App can do it automatically), auto-categorize the transactions to specific expense types/cost categories using our mapping algorithm and then send the data to GP with a click of a button. Any relevant information supplied by the credit card company in the data file can also be referenced in the ‘Memo’ field in GP, within Payables > Distributions.
The advantages that the Gorilla Integration App offers are:
* Send credit card data to GP through automation
* Complete visibility of credit card expenses in GP
* Prevent duplicate expenses in GP
* Improve the reconciliation process through reporting and analytics within Gorilla Expense
* Eliminate time consuming manual work of keying in data
Gorilla Expense supports integration with all the major credit card companies – AMEX, VISA and MasterCard and their various file formats. The flavors of credit cards that we support range from the standard Corporate Credit Card for T&E Expenses to Purchase Cards or P-Cards for making purchases on behalf of the employer.
Here is how the process works:
Step 1> The AP Manager opens the Gorilla Integration App and logs in as the Admin. Here we have selected GP2013 as the system to send the data to. The Integration App is typically accessed by the Admin user (belongs to Accounting/AP/IT etc.) in a company.
Logging into Integration App as Admin
Step 2> Once logged in we want to select and import the credit card file supplied by the card provider that is typically downloaded by the Admin on a weekly or monthly basis. In this example, we are using a file supplied by our AMEX corporate card on a monthly basis. The following screenshot shows how the Admin can select the respective card and its format.
Selecting the card and format
**Note: Depending on how the credit card program is setup and services offered by the card provider, Step 2 can be fully automated with no human intervention. In that case, the Gorilla Integration App will automatically ‘pick up’ and import the latest file supplied by the card provider from an FTP site. AMEX typically enables this offering by default for all their corporate card and P-card programs and Gorilla Expense supports this approach**
In the screenshot below, the admin has selected the AMEX file – ‘Transactions.csv’ for import. The file was downloaded from our online AMEX account.
Selecting the file downloaded from the AMEX website
Step 3> Once the file is selected, the Integration App automatically associates the expense type and vendor using our mapping algorithm as shown in the screenshot below. This makes the transactions complete and no manual work is need to categorize the transactions.
Auto-allocation of expense type and vendor
Step 4> The Admin can now select all transactions or select specific transactions to import into the system and send to GP. The screenshot below shows that two transactions were selected to send to GP. Out of the two, only the one shaded in Green was sent. The transaction shaded in Yellow was already submitted earlier and is highlighted as a duplicate transaction. The Gorilla Integration App prevents duplicate transactions from being sent to GP by using the ‘Unique Identifier’ number supplied by the credit card as part of their file. This a is a powerful feature that saves AP Managers lots of time in checking for duplicates and also makes the reconciliation process easier.
Import transactions and prevent duplicates
Step 5> Once all the transactions are imported into the Gorilla application, they are dragged and dropped into a batch and send to GP through automation using the same Integration App. The transactions show up as invoices within a batch called ‘GORILLA’. Depending on the payment method defined in the Gorilla application, the invoices are created to pay the employee or the corporate credit card.
In this example, our AMEX card has the payment method defined as AMEX which is tied to the ‘AMEX’ Vendor ID defined in GP. Here are a couple of screenshots that show the expense data in GP > Payables.
Invoice in Payables
When Distributions is opened, the details from the transactions, namely the vendor and the report number are also made available to provide additional visibility for the CFO / accounting manager and to make it easier to search for expense data in GP.
Distributions in GP
This explains how credit card data can be integrated into GP using the Gorilla Expense Integration App. The App is very flexible in allowing credit card data from multiple cards and various formats to be imported into the system. If you would like to see a live demo of the App or have any additional questions, please contact us at info@gorillaexpense.com
As we all know Dynamics GP provides an organization with solid agility and flexibility in meeting their business needs today and also into the future. With such flexibility, comes the ability to configure GP in many different ways to meet unique requirements of the organization – and this extends to expense reporting as well.
Gorilla Expense offers a fully automated and seamless integration with GP. We refer to this as ‘1-click’ integration’. We do this by using web services and eConnect, depending on the customer’s preference. While we can do a flat-file based integration, our customers love the way our integration app sends the data from several expense reports to GP with just a click! When it comes to expense reporting, there are multiple ways to integrate the data from our system to GP. In this series, we will be exploring the different flavors of our integration with GP.
Integration with Payables in GP – Series (1 of 3)
This is the standard and most common format of our integration with GP. Here, we send the expense data as a Payable Transaction Entry within the Purchasing module in GP. Expenses sent from our system will show up as invoices. Depending on the payment method defined in our system and the setup of vendors, the invoice will be issued for the employee or the corporate credit card.
Integration with Project Accounting in GP – Series (2 of 3) Here, we send the expense data from our system to the Project Accounting module in GP, where expenses will be captured against different cost categories and tied to specific open projects. The project workflow is also mapped within our system such that the respective project owner(s) will be approving the expense reports before they are sent to GP.
Integration with Receivings in GP – Series (3 of 3) Here, we will send the data as a Receivings Transaction Entry within the Purchasing module. The expenses are allocated to different cost categories and the PO number is referenced. Since these expenses will show up as Receivables once posted, this integration is used when the customer is planning to bill back their clients. The customer name /PO number is referenced in our application so that the expenses are tied to it.
Besides these, we can also configure our Integration App to do other forms of integration as needed. In the next article, we will showcase our integration with Payables in GP. Stay tuned!
