Hi everyone, I have two questions for you today, and some ideas for you to consider as well:
- What are your recommendations for auto-approval thresholds?
- Do you use exception levels to help drive your workflow?
Many organizations take advantage of workflow automation to build in auto-approvals at the manager and processor level for low-risk expense reports. The attached case study highlights one large organization where 46.97% of their expense reports get auto-approved without any human intervention needed. How useful is that? As long as managers and processors have the data they need to track spend against budget, you can give everyone a lot more time back in their day and also foster a spirit of empowerment and trust with employees.
My own recommendations are as follows, based on thresholds I built as a SAP Concur customer and what I’ve seen work well for other organizations. The most full-proof way to implement these changes is in conjunction with 100% audit through artificial intelligence as the first step in the workflow, with low risk reports still getting reviewed through automated audit tools, but skipping the human step entirely if compliant.
- Reports < $1,000 (or $250, $500, $750, $2,000, etc. depending on company’s comfort level)
- AND Reports with all required receipts attached, and no use of Missing Receipt Affidavit
- AND Reports with cash / out-of-pocket < $100
- AND Reports without personal use of corporate card
- AND Reports without major audit rule violations (examples follow)
- Incomplete itemizations
- Potential duplicate transactions
- Individual transactions > $500 (excluding hotel and air)
- Airfare > $1,000
- High risk international spend, based on transaction country
- Transactions with high risk vendors
