Integrating an expense management system with an ERP provides significant business value by automating expense management, strengthening financial control, and improving data accuracy.

Getting started with expense management automation

We have three videos in this series and recommend watching them in sequence: 

• An introduction to expense management
• Expense management admin setup
• Configuring and automating expense management flows

In this demo, we’ll show you how to automate the expense management process by setting up and configuring integrations between your ERP and expense management systems. 

We’ll use NetSuite and Concur Expense as examples, but you can connect with any system your company uses.

The challenges of manual expense management

Manually managing expenses introduces several risks and inefficiencies, such as high operational costs per expense, the potential for fraudulent expenses, and increased chances of reporting and taxation errors. These issues not only consume valuable time, but also expose your organization to financial inaccuracies that can have far-reaching consequences.

Integrating an expense management system with your ERP system through Celigo’s iPaaS addresses these challenges by automating the entire process. This integration reduces human error, speeds up expense processing, and ensures your organization remains compliant with tax regulations and reporting requirements.

A practical business use case

Consider a common scenario: syncing employee expense reports from your expense management system to your central ERP system. Without integration, this process involves manually entering data, which is time-consuming and error-prone. With Celigo, however, you can automatically transfer these reports, ensuring that all expenses are accurately recorded and easily accessible for approval and financial reporting.

This automated integration not only saves time, but also minimizes the risk of errors, enabling your finance team to focus on more strategic tasks rather than getting bogged down in manual data entry.

Using prebuilt templates

Using Celigo’s pre-built templates, available in the Celigo marketplace, you can efficiently automate your expense management process.

For example, the Concur Expense – NetSuite template includes pre-configured integration flows that can be customized to align with your specific business requirements.

These flows cover essential tasks, such as syncing expense reports, managing approvals, and ensuring that all data is accurately reflected in your ERP system. You can easily tailor these templates to fit your organization’s unique processes, giving you the flexibility to build a solution that works for you.

The impact of automation

By automating the integration between your expense management and ERP systems, you create a more efficient process for submitting and managing expense reports. This automation eliminates the need for manual data entry, reducing the likelihood of human error and ensuring that financial data is accurate and consistent across all systems.

With automation in place, the entire workflow is accelerated—from the initial entry of expense data to its final reporting in your ERP system. Employees can submit expenses more quickly, and finance teams can approve and reconcile them with greater speed and accuracy. Additionally, real-time data synchronization ensures that financial records are always current, enabling better cash flow management and more informed decision-making.

Additionally, automation helps maintain compliance by ensuring that all expenses are recorded according to company policies and tax regulations. This reduces the risk of discrepancies during audits and minimizes the chances of penalties due to errors in financial reporting.

Explore Builder’s Hub for more details on configuring integrations, best practices, advanced automation use cases, and the latest features.