Built for accountability, ready for change.
When compliance requirements are always in flux, and always non-negotiable, how can you ensure accountability from your employees while keeping costs under control?
Rely on a travel and expense platform that’s flexible and built for the way the utility and energy sector works, and you’ll be ready to manage spending with precision and oversight. You’ll be positioned to safeguard your budgets, reduce risk, and give teams tools they need to make compliant choices — with every booking and expense submitted.
The practical tip guide below highlights 12 actionable ways to improve oversight, reduce risk, and embed compliance into every step of the spend process with SAP Concur. Strategies include AI-powered auditing, proactive spend requests, sustainability tracking, duty of care integration, and real-time analytics—helping organizations safeguard budgets, meet evolving regulations, and prepare for audits.
As you assess your current system or evaluate a new one, make sure your spend solution can:
1. Recommend preferred suppliers, negotiated rates, and other compliance requirements as employees are making decisions — ensuring the most compliant decisions are the easiest to make.
2. AI to flag specific expense report spending that needs manager or auditor review before reimbursement.
3. Use human auditors – backed with artificial intelligence – to review up to 100% of expense reports to reduce improper payments and fraud, waste, and abuse.
4. Apply machine learning and generative AI to your spend management processes for increased accuracy, compliance, and speed – connecting it to real-world context like spend data, policy information, and travel history.
5. Accommodate pre-spend and travel requests. Use proactive requests to your advantage – giving employees, budget managers, and decision makers the foresight to see and manage multiple types of spending and keep costs low.
6. Make progress on sustainability goals by pointing travelers to the most carbonfriendly options as they book their trips. Use your spend and travel data to set, track, and manage sustainability efforts while complying with increasing environmental, social, and political governance (ESG) regulations.
7. Deliver in-the-moment tips and fast answers to employees’ questions as they’re making purchase decisions or filing their expense reports – to help them understand and comply with new or existing policies.
8. Make duty of care a priority by incorporating real-time travel safety alerts into your process. Employees will be less likely to cut corners and obey policies when they feel their safety is being taken into account.
9. Infuse analytics at every step – giving decision makers near-real-time information, so they can effectively manage budgets and tax requirements while keeping a close eye on compliance.
10. Use spend alerts to remind budget managers where their budgets stand, helping them avoid overspending, surprise expenses, and costly shortfalls.
11. Tap into in-depth reporting and analytics to review how you’re performing against policies, how to identify trends or gaps, and how to build improvement plans.
12. Use intelligent tech to auto-categorize expenses—like O&M or capital—so employees can make the right choices without second-guessing. This helps reduce errors, streamline reviews, and prepare you for state and federal audits or rate case reporting.
SAP Concur solutions make all of this possible – so you’re always prepared.
Even as regulations evolve and making the most of every dollar is more critical than ever, Concur solutions help you maintain control through intelligent automation, built-in oversight, and policy driven workflows. With compliance embedded across every step of the spend process, you’re ready for audits, ready for reporting—and ready for whatever comes next.
Learn more about how Concur can help you build a culture of compliance. Click here for automated software solutions.
