Expense management systems are in place for two primary things: to track and manage how a business spends its money. However, if you have an inefficient system, this can also spell financial loss for the company. Read more
It’s a fact–every business or organization will have to deal with expenses. And these expenses have to be recorded, reported, and processed. These have to be verified as well.
However, despite the times and technologies we have today, there are companies that still rely heavily on paper-based and manual expense reporting. Many employees may not complain as they are used to the way they have always done things. However, what they don’t know is that they may be missing out on so many things. Read more
A mid-sized organization has its share of challenges especially in this era of technology and globalization. Particularly in business travel and expense management, finance managers in these organizations can find several pain points that eventually trickle its way to company operations, and finally the bottom line. Therefore, it goes without saying that an effective expense management tool is necessary for any organization if they want to succeed in what they do and find this success reflected in their financials.
Enter Gorilla Expense. Read more
How much is it to travel from your main headquarters to your satellite office in another state? When you go around and ask your colleagues, odds are, they would have different answers.
This simple experiment shows just how easy and common it is for employees to make honest mistakes on their expense reports. The question is, however, are these really mistakes or deliberate misrepresentations? Read more
If you’re in the market for an expense management solution for your company, then you probably have an idea just how many solutions, technologies, vendors, features, and price points to choose from. All these can be overwhelming, not to add the available deployment options and the total business value each solution can potentially bring.
So, how do you choose the right expense management tool for you? Read more
There is always room for improvement when it comes to anything, and so, you’re probably reading this because you want to improve the current expense management system and processes you have.
So before shopping and procuring an expense management software, you have to look at the specific requirements of your organization. What does the day to day operations look like from an expense standpoint? Is the software going to scale and adapt to your needs? Do you deal with international travel and booking that needs to be addressed? Does your business use corporate credit cards?
Now that you have figured out your unique requirements, you have a better idea of what to look for to make your expense management so much more efficient. Take a look at these expense management software must-haves:
As you can see, there is not really one perfect solution that it comes down to. The best solution out there is really the one that works best for your company and your needs.
It is also important to understand how the expense management solution can configured to fit your organization. And there is where Gorilla Expense comes in. Gorilla Expense can accommodate various expense management needs, and we specialize in integrating the data into Microsoft Dynamics ERP. We work with various customers across the world and across myriad industries.
If you would like to see a live demo of the solution or have any questions, please contact us at sales@gorillaexpense.com
Making the T&E expense tracking process for Sage X3 efficient and timely is increasingly becoming important to several mid-sized and large clients. The benefits are huge – in terms of cost savings, compliance to the IRS, visibility of T&E spend for decision makers like CFOs and of course improvements in productivity for travelers. Businesses invest in a robust ERP system like Sage X3 primarily to realize such benefits.
The ERP solutions provided by Sage are comprehensive management and planning solutions that allow businesses to track their performance closely. Travel and expense reporting by its very nature is a tricky area to control and monitor. That’s where a system like Gorilla Expense makes a huge difference.
Gorilla Expense extends the capabilities of Sage X3 by providing a robust mobile + web platform for travelers to capture both, out of pocket and corporate credit card expenses. Once these expenses have been compiled and approved the expense data can be sent to various ‘pages’ in SAGE X3 (like Payables as an Invoice or as a GL entry etc.) depending on the client’s requirements.
As our company’s name suggests, we are the experts when it comes to T&E tracking and reporting. And businesses that use Sage ERP (all the way from Sage 100 to Sage 500) can benefit from and leverage our expertise and thought leadership in this space. Our automated solution for Sage ERP greatly benefits travelers, approving managers, and Accounting. In addition, Gorilla Expense now also integrates with Sage 300 and Sage 300 Construction & Real Estate
Here are some of our cool features:
And more at – Gorilla Expense Features
Besides the features we also specialize in dedicated and personalized support which is one of the main reasons client love working with Gorilla Expense!
So, embrace the technologies of the 21st century and say goodbye to frustrating and manual expense reporting processes that use Excel and Scotch tape. Let Gorilla Expense make this painless and paperless for you! Contact us at sales@gorillaexpense.com to learn more.
Take the pain out of year end expenses!
It’s December, it’s cold and it’s time to hibernate. Yet, finance and AP departments are busy closing the books, reconciling data and checking receipts. And guess what – this process is a last minute rush every year for employees, managers and AP.
But there are better ways to manage this work at the end of the year. And we’ve got the expense claims + receipts side of things taken care of for you. How do we do this? By being creative and smart with technology.
Smartphones are for more than Instagram
Most travelers own a smartphone and this is a very convenient medium for travelers to submit expenses in a few clicks. Receipt capture is the most common feature used on Gorilla Expense’s mobile app. We make it easy to also attach those pesky multi-page PDF receipts from our mobile app by syncing with Dropbox.
The magical cloud
Web based, accessible anywhere, data at your fingertips…..That’s how the Gorilla Expense web application works. Companies are increasingly looking towards web based solutions to tackle their expenses including getting manager approvals done sooner. The availability of analytics and reporting modules makes it super convenient to analyze the entire year’s data and review trends.
No joy in manual data entry
Finally, once all the expenses are submitted and approved, AP has to key in the data manually into Dynamics ERP (GP / NAV / AX / SL). Not anymore! We make the process seamless and as automated as possible. Click a button on our integration app, grab some egg nog and 5 minutes later all the data is in the ERP. Simple right? (well, we recommend egg nog after 5pm)
In conclusion….
December can be a very busy time for most finance and AP departments with plenty of things to juggle already. To ease the workload when it comes to expenses, receipts and mainly to reimburse employee sooner, look at automating T&E in your company. This could be one of the best investments in 2015!
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
The GBTA did a survey of more than 200 travel managers in the US on which expense types they mandate the usage of corporate card
No surprises that Airfare was the top at 67%. This is mainly to better manage the spend related to airfare and utilize programs and partnership with air travel vendors. Plus, in some cases, if tickets are canceled or modified, corporate cards have discounted change-fees for being part of the air travel vendor program. Closely following the Airfare expense type are Lodging and Rentals both of which maintain a similar philosophy.
Charging meals to the corporate card provides greater visibility from a compliance perspective. This is especially true if meals are related to Entertainment type expenses. Companies are also increasingly asking employees to charge misc. business expenses like internet, phone calls, faxes etc. to the corporate card to prevent potential frauds. For sales people on the road all the time, the corporate card is a big convenience for mileage and gas related expenses as well.
So, how do your company stack up compared to this? Which expense types do you mandate your users to use the corporate card for? Let us know in the comments below.
Reference: GBTA April 2014 survey. Chart provided by Travel Procurement, part of BTN Newsletter