The expense report validation and approval process is a crucial step in ensuring compliance with a company\u2019s reimbursement policy. It involves checking each expense incurred and detecting errors and missing receipts, while respecting the budgets that have been set. It is also a particularly tedious and repetitive process for managers and the accounting department. Here is a series of best practices you can follow to implement a more efficient expense validation process for everyone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Although it varies depending on the size of the organization, the expense report validation process involves two distinct types of controls:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In large companies, an additional step of approval by the manager\u2019s supervisor, often the department head, can be added to the workflow. In small organizations, it is not uncommon for the director to take direct responsibility for approving expense reports and entrust the accounting verification to an external accountant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some companies prefer expense reports to be approved by a supervisor before going through the accounting department, while others choose to do the reverse, asking assistants or accountants to first ensure that expense reports have been properly completed and supporting documents attached. The two systems are equally effective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you don\u2019t yet use a paperless process to manage your expense reports, this probably means that your employees print out Excel files and put them in an envelope with their paper receipts. These items will then be transferred from department to department, with an increased risk of document loss.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A clearly defined<\/strong> reimbursement policy<\/u><\/strong> must first be put in place, which all employees should be able to consult. The expense policy can take the form of a memo directly pre-recorded in the Excel file. It avoids any conflicts between the manager and the employee, and saves time at all levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A first best practice is to adopt a single format for all expense reports<\/strong>. By providing upstream tools to standardize expense reports, you will facilitate the downstream audit work. In companies with no expense report management software, Excel tends to be the solution of choice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When employees from different departments are involved in the same project, it might be useful to create a summary by department or by project<\/strong>, so that the department head can approve the expenses as quickly as possible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Depending on the size of the company, it may be advisable to implement a dual approval procedure involving both the manager and the department head<\/strong>. Since each person is responsible for each stage of the validation process, when the expense report exceeds a certain amount, it may also be appropriate to have it validated by a more senior manager.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With an expense report management software such as N2F, you can customize the order of the administrative verification and approval steps. You can then configure and automate the various approval steps according to your organization\u2019s needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Traditionally, each employee is attached to a department. As soon as an employee submits an expense report, the N2F software detects the employee\u2019s department and sends the expense report to the right manager. However, if the employee submits an expense report that relates to several departments, N2F offers the possibility of splitting the expense report into several parts, depending on the department to which the expense is allocated<\/strong>. The expenses will then go to the right manager for approval. To do this, the employee just has to fill in the department or the name of the project to which the expense report relates when completing the expense report. So, if an employee enters several expenses per project, it is possible to automatically send each expense to the appropriate project manager.<\/p>\n\n\n\n N2F also allows you to set up a second or third approval stage if the expense report exceeds a certain amount<\/strong>. The company can thus decide that all expense reports above 1,000 euros will immediately be sent to the manager\u2019s supervisor for validation, for example.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To ensure that the company\u2019s expense report policy is respected, N2F offers the option of sending expense reports that exceed the agreed limits to a designated person<\/strong>. For example, if the company has decided in its reimbursement policy that restaurant bills should not exceed 25 euros, and an employee enters an expense of 30 euros, the designated manager may decide on a case-by-case basis whether to raise the amount of the ceiling or not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To create a smoother validation process, you can configure your system so that:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some expenses may be re-invoiced to the client. In this case, the employee just needs to check the \u201cre-invoiceable\u201d box when completing the expense report. At the end of the project, N2F then allows you to export a summary of the expenses re-invoiceable to the client<\/strong>, which can be attached to the invoice. By using a workflow adapted to this notion of re-invoicing, all the expense reports concerned can be forwarded to a designated manager, in order to ensure an additional control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The validation process ends when the accounting department records the expense reports in the accounting system. This involves generating the accounting entry files <\/strong>\u2013 which can be injected directly into the accounting system \u2013 as well as the SEPA transfer files for reimbursing employees<\/strong>. N2F thus provides a complete circuit ending with the reimbursement of the expense report.<\/p>\n\n\n\nStandardize expense reports<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Collect expense reports by team or by project<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Implement dual approval procedures<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The power of expense report management software for more efficient validation processes<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Validation by project and by team: ensure that each expense report is validated by the right manager<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Exceeding the expense report limit<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Reimbursement of expenses depending on the payment method used<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Expense reports re-invoiceable to the client<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Accounting for expense reports<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
4 good reasons to adopt the N2F expense report management solution<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n