How to manage employee expenses

Wouldn’t it be great if you could stop worrying about sorting out paper receipts and reimbursing your employee for business expenses and focus on what truly matters — growing your business? With the right expense management software, you can.  

Expense management software processes pay and audit employee expenses. They are particularly useful if your business often must deal with staff expenditure, including those spent on company trips, fuel, or accommodation.  

So, how exactly can an employee expense management app help you better keep track and address business-related costs? Let’s dive in and explore its many benefits.  

What is an employee expense? 

There are many different costs that staff members might incur in the name of a business. Some examples include expenses associated with:  

• Company trips abroad or cross country to meet with a client 

• Food expenditure during business trips   

• Accommodation fees such as hotel stays   

• Fuel for a company car or vehicle used during business operations  

• Ad hoc expenses, like needing to print off documents while at a business event  

Regardless of the type of employee expense, employers will need to pay their employees back.  

This helps to accurately pay your staff back the right amount. 

Which you must do. Under current Canada employee expense reimbursement law, it’s a legal requirement for you to pay back staff. 

And you’re in luck, as it’s never been easier to do that. With employee expense reimbursement software, you can quickly forward accurate payments to your staff. More on that further below. 

How to manage employee expenses 

It’s a process businesses and employees don’t particularly like. But it’s a necessary step, otherwise costs could get out of control. 

Traditionally, it was a time-consuming, complex, and annoying tasks for businesses to complete. 

It’d involve hunting through receipts after a trip abroad and working out how much was spent. And there are three ways to go about maintaining this: 

Use a fair policy

This should clearly state what your process is—and the actions your staff must follow. Use clear English for this, leaving out tax jargon that could confuse your staff members. You want them to know the steps they need to follow. 

Consider everyone

The process must take into consideration the needs of your business—and workforce. If, for example, there’s a trip in the benefit of your business, you shouldn’t make employees pay for it. So, if they need to spend money for work purposes you should look to repay them. It’s good business practice and can maintain good working relationships. 

Make your process easy

This is for the good of your business—and to make it a painless experience for staff. You can help here by removing the need for masses of paperwork and receipt documenting. Trust your staff. And perhaps provide them with software that lets them document their expenditure. But, above everything, make sure you make employee expense reimbursements on time (and accurately). 

How to record employee expenses 

These days, an employee expense management system will take care of the three steps managing expenses: 

1. Keep track of your business’ costs

2. Analyze your expenses

3. Collect invoices and other documents

Of course, it’s important you collect all your invoices. You may have an accounting team to manage the above for you. Or you can outsource services to take care of it for you. 

Discover PoP - BrightHR's employee expense tracker for on the go

So, what’s the best system to pay employees for expenses? And what’s the best app to keep track of staff expenditure? 

With PoP, our expense tracker, you can take care of everything in one simple app. It is easy to use and accessible, letting you manage your employee expenses from anywhere!

Essentially, PoP is an employee expense reporting software—it just looks, and performs, in an engaging and understandable way. Some of the perks include: 

• Staff can easily log into the system to log expenses. All of which you can approve—or decline—with just a few taps. 

• Real-time notifications for expenditure requests 

• Accurate cost reporting 

• View and update employee expense reports with ease 

The app allows you to follow the best practices for employee expense reports. Which includes ensuring your record keeping is accurate—and paying your staff the correct amounts. 

You can also cut out any chance of errors, such as not paying staff back, or overpaying them by mistake. 

To enhance your expense tracking and to ensure your staff expense requests are dealt with efficiently, book a free demo to see how PoP can work for your business. For more information or support with your PoP app, get in touch with our team.