Spend Management Transformation

Spend Management Transformation & Harmonisation

Our experts work closely with your organisation to tailor the most appropriate solution that integrates with your policies, meets your budgets, and is scalable and future-ready to meet the needs of expanded business requirements or operations. FinTrans Solutions brings the thought leadership & expertise needed to deliver the following through the functional design of harmonised T&E or P2P Processes within the context of SAP Concur and subsequent end-to-end cloud implementation:

Business case development support
Harmonisation of T&E and P2P policies towards leading practices
Implementation of global T&E and P2P Policies
Spend Management Strategy and global Template/Blueprint development
Process mapping, including improvement and recommended T&E and P2P practices

The ultimate result is intended to generate the following benefits

Lean and integrated Best Practice Intelligent Spend Management processes with a high degree of automation
System-driven policy compliance: Auto-enforced policy compliance from Request/Requisition to Pay
Better Spend Governance and cost savings through workflow enabled processes, improved compliance rates, and the ability to negotiate lower rates with suppliers/carriers and to reclaim GST/VAT
Elevated Productivity through cycle time reduction (processing time, travel planning time, workflow approval time, expense reimbursement time, etc.)
Simplicity and Usability (e.g., OCR features, Concur mobile app and partner app enablement)
Seamless Integration between Concur and your business application (ERP Finance, HRMS, Vendor Master, and CRM)
Credit Card Feed integration with all common card programs
Standardised paperless expense reports and invoices
Simplified approval workflow processes, including auto-notifications & reminders
Drill-down KPI and Reporting capabilities (Analytics and Intelligence) paired with access to real-time data
Pre- and post-payment system-supported audit policies & processes

The steps taken to achieve these outcomes can be broken down into the following components

Alignment of T&E Management or P2P mission and strategic principles
Simple, clearly defined and clearly communicated Global T&E Management or P2P policy template
Setting up of Global Integration Strategy, considering inbound and outbound key integration points and transfer methods (e.g., SAP ICS native integration, Concur Web API Integration, or SFTP flat file integration)

Design of To-Be functional design which embraces Intelligent Spend Management Best Practices, result in adherence to policies, a positive user experience, and improved productivity
Clear segregation of spend (AP vs T&E) for better spend governance and downstream reporting capabilities
Definition of one common and streamlined spend or expense type catalogue, workflow, receipt handling, and payment hold
Metrics and incentives to improve the cycle time of the “Travel Request-to-Claim-to-Reimbursement” Process (T&E) and the “Purchase-to-Invoice-to-Pay” Process (P2P)

Definition of rigor to drive harmonisation and auto-enforce policies & procedures
Definition of permissible deviations from the Global/Best Practice template to account for country-specific requirements of legal, statutory, and tax compliance related nature
Setup of a uniform organization hierarchy structure with differentiation by country, legal entity, division, and function
Standardised audit & compliance procedures (pre-payment and post-payment) by applying statistical measures focusing on materiality in terms of risk, value, and transaction volume
Global vendor management through a dedicated category manager (e.g., Self-Booking Tool)

Establishment of governance on global and local levels that differentiates between global and local roles and responsibilities
Use of defined/preferred vendors
Defined means of travel as per comprehensive travel rule sets
Travel Requests subject to pre-trip approvals
Amounts Limits apply by employee type and grade or vendor type
Defined forms of payment, e.g., Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT), company-paid credit cards, AP posting and payment

FinTrans Solutions works in close collaboration with its customers to evaluate and tailor the best solution in order to meet their Intelligent Spend Management priority and business requirements.

The entire spend management transformation is aligned with our following guiding principles.

Clarified mandate and mission
Strong global governance
Right fit of concepts and designs to mandate and mission
Aspiration to drive standard global T&E and P2P policies with a minimum of localisations
Focus on adoption & change management including change impact analysis, communication, workforce enablement through training, stakeholder management, and change monitoring

Standardization of the To-Be integration landscape and RICEFW
Processes and solution design following Concur standard functionality
Configuration enhancements in existing standard solution
Global vendor management through a dedicated category manager (e.g., Self-Booking Tool)

Illustration: T&E Approach Example Path to a Best Practice Solution

To ensure that every transformation meets our high standards, we adhere to the following key functional design principles, while leveraging our thought leadership and in-depth experience in the Intelligent Spend Management domain:

One global or standard process and SaaS application – SAP Concur
Consistent organisational setup with end-to-end delivery responsibility
Employees are empowered to arrange their own travel and manage expenses
Leverage global data standards (Expense/spend types, Standard Chart of Account, Employee master data, etc)
Minimise the need for manual intervention and strive for paperless processing, where possible
One back-office claim & invoice auditing approach
Segment payment and reimbursement requests into risk categories for audit
Enable T&E and third-party invoice spend data analysis for the purpose of vendor & travel sourcing as well as internal control

Global Template/ Blueprint

Standardized expense & invoice management processes, including employee reimbursement and vendor payment options
Ideally a single GL account code setup based on a common Chart of Account (mapping expense/spend types to GL codes)
Standardized entitlements as per policy based on connected or simple lists, e.g., employee types and bands
Pre-defined catalogue of expense types (T&E) and Spend types (P2P) across categorize determined based on nature of spend
Common T&E and P2P Policy rules embedded within the solution to support employee compliance
Single set of forms (Header, Segments/Entry and Allocation level)
Common rule sets across invoice capture and PO matching (P2P related only)
Common settings for itemization and allocation of spend line items
Standardized approval workflow configuration for:

Local requirements of legal, regulatory and statutory nature, limited to:

Get a free POC with Just 1 call. Within 3 business days.

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Try before you buy. With a free PoC (proof of concept).

Just give us a call and we will conduct a T&E best-practice process & Concur value proposition session, while capturing your specific key business requirements. This will be followed by a developed Proof of Concept, building end-to-end scenarios in our sandbox, reflecting your key design requirements. FinTrans will run a Concur UI-based walkthrough (from Travel Request-to- Book-to-Claim) to provide a clear idea on your future user experience and solution benefits. In just 3 business days.

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FinTrans Solutions is regarded as one of the most trusted SAP Concur CIP partners globally. FinTrans Solutions pioneered this domain in the Asian market with its client-centric approach and – since then – rapidly gained recognition for delivery excellence globally. We have consistently been able to build on our expertise and create a reputation for sound analysis, seamless end-to-end implementation, and rock-solid application maintenance support across the globe.