Concur, a provider of travel expense management technology, last week rolled out enhancements that it said provided an industry first: the capability to automatically reconcile booked travel with actual spending, down to the line-item level.
The company also introduced features to provide improved options for curtailing carbon emissions associated with a corporation's travel.
Redmond, Wash.-based Concur announced the developments in advance of the National Business Travel Association International Convention in Los Angeles this week, where it will provide demos on the trade show floor.
Michael Hilton, Concur's executive vice president of worldwide marketing, said Concur had taken its program to "the next generation of analytics capabilities" by combining and reconciling travel agency data, credit card data, supplier data and the traveler's cash expenses for a 100% match between booked travel and real spend.
Concur said capturing all the information needed to make the 100% match is possible only by incorporating the expense report process.
Historically, Hilton said, Concur and other service providers have matched travel agency and credit card data, but that information is not complete enough to provide the quality that customers want.
For one thing, Hilton said, there is a problem with leakage, meaning staffers' failure to use the designated booking channel and credit card. Concur said traveler compliance on those two issues averages about 60%.
The company, which says it processes 10% of about $300 billion in global travel and expense spend, estimated that its new systems for data collection and analytics would offer the opportunity for Concur's 7,000 clients to save as much as $1 billion.
Hilton said it was possible now to collect more good data because suppliers, especially car rental and hotel companies, are working with the Concur Connect program to drop electronic versions of their invoices into the Concur expense reporting program.
Concur, which previously established electronic links with Choice Hotels, Hilton Hotels, Intercontinental Hotels and the Deutsche Bahn railroad, announced Avis/Budget and SNCF, the French rail company, have signed as well. New participants on the airline side are two Mexican carriers, Interjet and Volaris, plus Southwest's corporate booking arm, SWABiz.
A beefed-up green travel component, meanwhile, can now display rail, the better choice from the environmental standpoint, on the screen with air services, Concur said. And its software enables users to sort air and rail options based on carbon emissions.
Hilton said getting the rail options on the screen was particularly important to European customers, but the database includes Amtrak and Via Canada, as well.
Concur said it offers corporations a choice of possible standards for calculating their emissions. Post-trip reports can show carbon emissions and enable companies to delve into the variances between booked travel and the actual travel, Concur said.