Managing business expenses can be a time-consuming and tedious task, especially when using outdated processes. From manually tracking receipts to sifting through piles of reports, these tasks can eat up valuable hours that could be better spent elsewhere.

Fortunately, with the right strategies and tools, you can significantly reduce the time spent on expense management. Here are 10 tricks to save time and streamline your expense management process.

Automation is the fastest way to save time on expense management. By adopting an expense management platform that can automatically capture, categorize, and submit expenses, you eliminate most manual work. According to PayStream Advisors, businesses that automate their expense processes reduce time spent on report management by 40%.

“Automation turns a tedious, multi-step process into a few clicks. It’s the most effective way to save time,” says David Green, CFO at AutomateNow.

Open banking allows you to integrate live credit card data feeds into your expense system, eliminating manual data entry. With real-time transaction data, your system can automatically pull, categorize, and match expenses with receipts, reducing errors and speeding up the reconciliation process by 70% according to FinSync Solutions.

“With live credit card feeds, the need for employees to manually input expense data is gone, saving us hours every week,” notes Sarah Johnson, CFO at FinSync.

Allow employees to use mobile apps to scan and upload receipts in real-time. Tools like Systematics, SAP offer mobile scanning that automatically extracts key data from receipts and inputs them directly into the system. According to Chrome River, businesses using mobile receipt capture save an average of 10 minutes per report.

“It’s amazing how much time is saved when employees can snap a photo of their receipt and be done with it,”

A lot of time is wasted when employees submit expenses that don’t comply with company policies. Create clear, easy-to-understand guidelines for acceptable expenses. According to Certify, companies with clear policies reduce rejected expense reports by 25%, which saves time in follow-up and corrections.

“We found that policy violations were one of our biggest time wasters, so we simplified our guidelines and saw an immediate improvement,” shares Jane Willis, COO at ExpenseEase.

Encourage employees to submit expenses in batches instead of one at a time. According to SAP, businesses that process expenses in weekly or monthly batches reduce the time spent on approvals by 15%. This reduces the frequency of approvals while ensuring that reports are processed more efficiently.

“Batch processing helps us manage expenses in bulk and reduces the constant interruptions from single report submissions,” says John Brown, Head of Finance at QExpense.

Automated workflows allow expense reports to move through the approval process without manual intervention. Set up rules that trigger automatic approvals for low-value expenses or compliant reports. Levvel Research found that businesses using automated workflows reduce approval times by 35%, ensuring faster reimbursement and less back-and-forth between employees and managers.

“Our expense approval workflow is now completely hands-off for smaller expenses, freeing up managers’ time,” says Lisa Martin, VP of Finance at ExpenseEase.

Prepaid business cards with set limits allow employees to make purchases within budget, eliminating the need for reimbursements and detailed expense tracking. This cuts down on report processing time and ensures that expenses stay within company policy. A Spend Journal study showed that businesses using prepaid cards saw a 20% reduction in overall expense management time.

“Prepaid cards gave us instant control over spending without the need for constant report reviews,” notes Paul Anderson, CTO at OpenTech Solutions.

For businesses that reimburse employees for travel, tracking mileage can be a tedious task. Tools like automatically track and log business miles, saving time on manual entry.

According to TechRadar, companies using automated mileage tracking save an average of 2-3 hours per employee per month.

By integrating your expense management system with your accounting software, you avoid duplicating data entry and speed up the reconciliation process. According to Gartner, companies that integrate these systems reduce administrative tasks by 25% and close their books faster.

“We linked our expense system with our accounting software, and the time saved on reconciling expenses at the end of the month has been significant,” shares Samantha Green, Financial Analyst

AI can be used to automatically flag suspicious or non-compliant expenses for further review, reducing the time spent manually combing through reports. Forbes reports that AI can reduce the time spent on auditing expenses by 30%.

“AI catches things we used to spend hours looking for manually—policy violations, anomalies, duplicates. It’s a huge time-saver,” says David Green

Expense management doesn’t have to be a time sink. By adopting these time-saving tricks—like automating your reporting process, using real-time data feeds, and leveraging AI—businesses can save valuable hours, improve accuracy, and streamline their workflows. The future of expense management is automated, integrated, and effortless.

At Systematics, we develop custom expense management systems that integrate with systems and deliver perfect fit for your business. Have you automated your expense management process yet? What hurdles have you faced? Let’s discuss in the comments.