Need different managers/approvers in Expense than in Travel

[USWsdymerski]

We have had Travel for several years. We are currently piloting Expense (Standard). We have found that a sync of the user profiles between Expense and Travel is causing the Travel "manager" field to be updated/overwritten with the value in the Expense "manager" field. Our business model requires that we have different approvers for Travel than Expense (the Travel approvers are not everyone's managers). Every workflow in Expense Standard has "Manager" as the first approver (except for 'straight to Processor'). So when we assign "approvers" to a user in Expense, the first approver is automatically assigned as the "manager" of the user in both Expense and Travel. This is the case in user setups in both Expense Settings and Company -> User Administration. In Company -> User Administration, is there any way to assign "Manager" on the user profile, and then on the Expense Settings at the bottom of the page, when you click the Approvers button, you can assign a first level approver (which is what it is called on the screen, it is not called "manager") and have it NOT change the "Manager" value for the user on their Travel Profile?

Alternatively, if we assign Manager on the User Administration screen, then switch to Expense Settings and assign the first approver/manager there, can the sync of "Manager" between Expense and Travel be "turned off" so that Travel and Expense can retain a different Manager for the user for each app? or can the Manager field in Travel be frozen from update except by administrator roles?

Optimally, the best enhancement I could suggest is that since User Administration refers to the Expense Settings Approvers ONLY as approvers (it doesn't say on the screen that when you choose Approver 1 you are really changing this person's MANAGER - this is quite misleading), Concur should just add one more workflow to Expense Standard where it does NOT use "Manager" as the first approver, but instead Approver1 > Approver2 > ... up to 5, so that business models that require different expense approval routings not involving managers, or involving them at a later step, can use this and not have it affect the Manager setup in Travel.

Any feedback is appreciated as we have identified this as a critical roadblock to implementing Expense module.

[MelanieT]

@USWsdymerski Hi!  Thanks for posting here.  Here is more info on how to change the setting and also just the syncing of Travel and Expense Managers.  

Professional Edition:

To have the Expense Approver and Travel Manager Fields synchronized/unsynchronized, open a case with SAP Concur Support requesting the synchronization/turn off synchronization.

Standard Edition:

Currently, there is a known limitation with Expense Approver syncing to Travel managers when using a User import in an Expense Standard and Travel Standard Platform. The sync seems to work intermittently. There is a project to to get this resolved in the future. The Travel Managers can be added manually or via the Import Data import in Travel. 

Additional Information

If travel manager is updated via the UI, Import via the UI or updated in a 350 file, the synchronization may break When the User Import (under User Administration) the Employee Extract to Travel job must also run after this job, otherwise the information may not be synchronized to the Travel database This is a company-wide setting, and cannot be enabled or disabled for specific groups or users only This setting is only for Expense Approver (Default Approver) and Travel Manager, it's not applicable to the Default Approver 2.  There is a known issue if the SAP Concur Expense platform is Standard, while the SAP Concur Travel is Professional.   The sync could work intermittently, but the configuration of Standard with Professional is not supported per our Development team.  The workaround is to use the Import Data tool via Travel Administration to update Travel Managers.

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[USWsdymerski]

@MelanieT Thank you for the information and clarification on the limitations of SAP Concur Expense when also using the Travel platform. While this answers some of my questions, there is no simple solution at present with the "best practice" format provided to us that will allow our business model/approval requirements in both Travel and Expense. I am wondering if my suggestion to enhance Expense Standard by providing an additional workflow that does not have "Manager" as the first approver has ever been submitted as an Enhancement Request and if not, would it be possible to create an ER to ask for this?

[MelanieT · Accepted solution]

@USWsdymerski There is a setting to allow you to have a custom workflow, but this would need to be updated on our side.  You would need to create a Support case for this and a Support Engineer would be able to assist.  

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