In 2024, businesses are facing a rapidly changing environment, with decentralized workforces, more frequent business travel, and a dynamic macroeconomic landscape creating unique challenges for managing expenses. To grow sustainably and keep costs in check, effective expense management is crucial for any business strategy. Here are some trends shaping travel and expense management this year:
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Growing Use of Credit Cards
Small to medium-sized businesses are increasingly issuing corporate cards to their employees. Although a significant number of these companies plan to boost their use of corporate cards, the adoption of expense management software hasn’t kept pace. This discrepancy forces employees and finance teams to endure time-consuming manual receipt handling and monthly reconciliations, which can negatively impact productivity and profits. Many modern corporate cards now come equipped with software that allows real-time tracking of spending, simplifying expense reporting and eliminating the need for employees to use their own cards for work expenses. -
Decentralized Work and Decision-Making
The modern workplace continues to be mostly decentralized, with a large portion of employees working remotely or in hybrid setups. This situation makes it challenging to monitor and control spending. As a result, there is an increasing demand for corporate cards to be issued to remote and hybrid workers, enabling them to manage their expenses independently. Even as more employees return to the office part-time, hybrid work models continue to influence how companies manage travel and expenses, highlighting the need for better oversight and management to reduce unnecessary spending. -
Persistent Challenges in Expense Management
Year after year, finance leaders face the same challenges with traditional expense management systems, such as lengthy manual reporting, difficult onboarding processes, and complicated credit card reconciliation. However, emerging technologies like AI, automation, and machine learning are making these processes more manageable, freeing employees and finance leaders to focus on more important tasks. While spreadsheets are still in use, smarter software solutions are quickly transforming how businesses handle expenses. -
Revival of Business Travel
Business travel is set to exceed pre-pandemic levels in 2024, necessitating stricter management of travel expenses. The rise of ‘bleisure’ travel, where employees combine business trips with personal leisure time, complicates the division between work and personal expenses. Businesses need to take employee experiences into account when managing travel expenses, making corporate booking tools pivotal in controlling spending and avoiding off-platform bookings that can lead to inefficiencies. -
Focus on Policy and Compliance
With distributed workforces and increased business travel, keeping policies and compliance at the forefront is more important than ever. Many companies now lack well-maintained expense policies, but luckily, automation can help. By providing real-time, universal policy enforcement and automatic flagging of out-of-policy expenses, businesses can maintain focus on policy compliance without cumbersome manual processes. -
Avoiding Unused Software
Companies are growing tired of paying for technology they don’t fully utilize. As consumption-based software models gain popularity, businesses will seek more flexible pricing options aligned with their unique needs and budgets. Companies are looking for software that is configurable to their specific processes, leaving behind one-size-fits-all solutions in favor of those offering greater ROI.
Overall, as hybrid work becomes more common, the importance of effective expense management solutions becomes more evident. Businesses need tools that offer visibility, seamless onboarding, data-driven insights, and tight control over expenses without stifling innovation. Flexibility and integration will remain crucial features in any future-proof expense management system, ensuring they meet the demands of today’s workforce and financial teams.
