The Future of Travel Expense Processing

Summary

Imagine a day when filing expense reports is a thing of the past. During the trip, receipts are captured electronically and placed into the correct expense categories. Expenses are automatically submitted for approval and payment as they occur, and they are then paid automatically with no need to ever provide your credit card. The experience will be truly magical! This is certainly the dream and desire of all business travelers. Despite advances in expense management systems, we have not yet arrived at this frictionless environment, but how far away is this vision? 

To better understand the future of expense systems, Phocuswright interviewed three leading executives from expense management software companies: Barry Padgett, executive vice president, traveler services of Concur Technologies; Dean Forbes, CEO of KDS; and David Barrett, CEO of Expensify. From the insights of these executives and looking at current trends, this paper projects the future of the expense reporting process.