Admin Tips & Tricks: Advance Your Program - Car and Mileage

Erica Brown · Dec 7, 2025

Advance Your Travel and Expense Program

As your organization evolves, so should the way you manage spend. Concur offers powerful tools beyond travel and expense that can help you drive greater visibility, accuracy, and control across your business. In this collection of articles, find expert-backed tips to help you take advantage of capabilities like audit rules, mileage tracking, pre-spend approvals, and data-driven reporting. Whether you’re aiming to catch errors before they become issues or streamline how employees request and track spend, these insights are designed to help you elevate your travel and spend management strategy.

In this section, you will find peer and expert-sourced guidance on the following topics:

Car and Mileage

Automate mileage tracking to improve accuracy and control

Put an end to self-reported mileage by using Drive, a service from SAP Concur solutions embedded in the Concur Mobile App. Configure it to track trips automatically based on specific days and times – no manual entry required. Improve reimbursement accuracy and automation by using the GPS maps/route functions that already exist on iOS and Android devices.

Fixed and variable rate (FAVR) mileage

FAVR is an alternative reimbursement method (US only) that’s appropriate for high mileage drivers (>5k miles per year). Rather than the traditional cents/mile reimbursement, FAVR is a more efficient capture method and represents mileage cost reduction for the company. FAVR has an automated rate calculator that accounts for license/registration fees, depreciation, insurance, maintenance, fuel, and tire costs.

Different mileage rates for different employee criteria

Typically, all users of personal or organizational vehicles in one country are paid the same mileage rates. Setting up mileage rates by mileage groups allows you to set different mileage rates and car classes based on different criteria in your organization within the same country. Some may also reimburse a mileage rate even for employees who ride bicycles to work or use electric vehicles, or drive over x mile in a year’s period. (see: Car Configuration Setup Guide).

Automatic car reservations

Turn on automatic car reservations with Wizard Options to automatically reserve a policy-compliant car with your preferred supplier when making travel accommodations. Configuration allows for control over what class/type/vendor can be selected from or auto defaulted during the travel booking process.

Don’t overlook ground transportation spend

Limos, taxis, and rideshares often fly under the radar, but unmanaged ground transportation costs can add up fast. Use Concur Travel to analyze this category and consider enabling a Ground Connector to bring spend under policy. SAP Concur App Center partners like Uber and Lyft for business can help increase visibility – often at lower cost by a margin of 20%-30%, particularly for longer or non-congested routes. In cities like NYC, Seattle, and Las Vegas, rideshare fees and surge charges can be more costly, as users have reported taxis being cheaper by $20 or more.

Monitor excessive personal car mileage

Use the Excessive Personal Car Mileage report to find employees who frequently claim high mileage reimbursements instead of renting a car. Consider setting a mileage threshold where renting becomes more cost-effective, and implement an audit rule requiring justification when that threshold is exceeded. This not only helps reduce costs, but also supports traveler safety.

Google maps integration

Mileage is one of the most commonly misused expense categories because it lacks receipts or documentation. With Google Maps integration, users simply enter their starting point and destination, and the system automatically calculates the distance.

Easy adjustments: Users can edit routes when needed.
Built-in controls: Audit rules track variances and enforce commute mileage deductions.
Better documentation: Required Google Maps waypoints provide a clear record of the route taken.
Global support: Available worldwide (except North Korea and China).

This approach streamlines the user experience while giving finance teams the transparency and control they need.

Reduce parking costs with reservation tools

Parking is a significant but often overlooked business travel expense. Consider using partners like SpotHero, The Parking Spot, and ParkWhiz to make it easy for travelers to reserve and expense parking, while improving visibility and reducing overall spend.