Lion and Honda New Zealand are some of the organisations that have adopted Concur expense solutions to drive efficiency, compliance, and accuracy in spending against the COVID-19 backdrop.
German software enterprise SAP shared in its recent financial reports that SAP Concur, the company’s travel and expense management business, has been massively impacted by the global travel restrictions, contributing to the decline in pay-as-you-go transactional revenues. Nevertheless, SAP Concur continues to deliver on its commitment to support organisations’ digital transformation by offering intelligent tools to reinvent and streamline travel, expense, and invoice management processes. In the second half of 2021, when business travel has started to return, SAP Concur has achieved sequential revenue stability for the first time since the onset of the pandemic in 2020.
Jonathan Beeby, SAP Concur Managing Director for the ANZ region, earlier said that the company has been partnering with enterprises and public sector agencies to address the fast-evolving challenges related to employee travel, expenses, and supplier invoices. In Australia for instance, SAP supports the Government’s effort to increase the adoption of e-invoicing across the country by integrating SAP procurement platforms including SAP Concur with PEPPOL (Pan European Public Procurement On-Line) access points to allow customers access to PEPPOL infrastructure when facilitating transactions. Furthermore, as a major procurement solutions partner of the Australian Government, the tech giant is giving its full support to all the Commonwealth agencies mandated by the Australian Taxation Office to adopt e-invoicing by 1 July 2022.
Organisations Adopting Concur Travel & Expense Solutions
More organisations, both private and public, that have adopted SAP Concur travel and expense solutions to help them thrive during times of disruptions are:
Lion
One of the leading beverage suppliers in Australasia, Lion partnered with SAP Concur for a three-year phased project to enhance employee experience, improve spend visibility and reporting, and achieve greater control over travel and employee safety. Aside from deploying Concur Expense and Concur Travel to streamline T&E processes, the company implemented Concur Detect in July 2021 allowing Lion to reach 100{8bf2b29f36318f0ac46ab1cc03d7035abce669a1cea16c9ed62389a818fa22fd} audit coverage that resulted in stronger internal controls and enhanced overall compliance.
”Concur’s custom reporting and spend visibility generated through monthly leader reports and Power BI dashboards has given us so much more governance and control on spending across the organisation,” said Andrew Cork, Finance Services Director, Lion Australia and New Zealand.
Honda New Zealand
Driven by the company’s business goals to improve sustainability and address process inefficiencies, Honda New Zealand deployed Concur Expense and Concur Invoice. Besides automating spend management, the two solutions seamlessly integrated with its legacy system offering mobility and flexibility for its mobile, dispersed workforce.
“Both solutions went off without a hitch. When we hit the button the solutions started and we were up and running” Joe Hall, chief financial officer, Honda NZ. “The benefits we get, the staff satisfaction, the efficiency, we have supplier satisfaction because they get paid a lot quicker, these are all important things for having a good working environment going forward. I wouldn’t hesitate to automate.”
CAF America
Global grantmaking organisation CAF America leveraged Concur Expense to support its employee’s work-from-home transition. Employees were allocated $1,500 to support their home office set up. Within two weeks, the company received a reimbursement request totaling over $42,000 submitted by 80 percent of the staff and the employees were paid back with their next paycheck.
The Tech Interactive
The Tech Interactive, a family-friendly science and technology center in Silicon Valley, automated its expense and invoicing processes with cloud-based SAP Concur solutions.
“We’ve realised not everything has to happen on site,” said Brandon Lewke, Controller at The Tech Interactive. “Some things should, but some things can happen offsite, especially when you’re in a nonprofit. But with SAP Concur solutions, the stuff that can happen remotely can be done from anywhere.”
Serco Group
A leading provider of public services in the UK, Serco adopted Concur Travel at the time when the government announced its first lockdown to enable the company to locate employees and arrange return trips for stranded business travelers. Joanne Cartwright, Manager Services Director at Serco, explained that the SAP empowered the company to take care of its employees’ welfare and safety during those times. She added:
“When the pandemic hit, our first mission was to bring home our employees quickly and safely—and the SAP Concur platform really facilitated that.”
Penn State University
The top-ranked research university has over 35,000 employees, including faculty and staff, that needed to be looked after during the lockdowns. Leveraging Concur Travel, the Penn State was able to move unused airfare booked through the platform to a new UATP (Universal Air Travel Plan) card for future business travels.
“Although we don’t mandate the use of Concur Travel, since the pandemic, a lot of departments are now doing that on their own,” said Lisa Steinbugl, E-Procurement, Travel and Purchasing Card Manager at Penn State. “They clearly saw the value of what the tool offers in terms of duty of care.”
