Managing your finances in QuickBooks requires careful attention to detail, especially when it comes to categorizing credit card payments. Whether you’re a small business owner or managing personal finances, properly categorizing these payments ensures accurate financial reporting, helps track expenses, and simplifies tax preparation.
In this blog, we’ll guide you through the process of recording and categorizing credit card payments in QuickBooks, highlighting common mistakes, best practices, and frequently asked questions.
Categorizing credit card payments in QuickBooks is crucial for maintaining accurate financial records. Each payment needs to be recorded under the appropriate category to reflect your true financial position.
Now, follow the steps below to categorize your credit card payments in QuickBooks:
Step 1: Log into QuickBooks Online.
Step 2: Select “Transactions” from the left menu. Once it opens the “banking” page, find and select your credit card account.
Step 3: Under the “Review” tab, choose the specific transaction you'd like to categorize.
Step 4: Specify details like your vendor or customer, the expense type, and any relevant labels. Pick a spending category from the list, input the amount, and finish filling out the form.
Step 5: Click “Add” to let QuickBooks categorize your credit card payments.
These steps improve efficiency by outlining how to process credit card payments in QuickBooks Online the fastest way.
Pay down a credit card. This is the main way to record your credit card payments in QuickBooks.
Here’s a step-by-step guide to pay down a credit card in QuickBooks Online:
Step 1: Click on the '+' sign in the top left corner. Choose 'Pay down credit card' from the 'Other' options."
Step 2: If you choose pay down your credit card, this is the page you'll see. Pick the credit card you used or add a new one if it's not listed.
Step 3: Provide the payment amount and the date it was issued. The recipient's name and details are optional.
Step 4: After filling in the other information, you can choose the bank account that was used for the payment.
Step 5: If you paid by check, choose the "Check payment" option. Enter the check number in the "Check number" field. If you paid electronically, input the EFT number.
Step 6: If you'd like to include comments or attached files, choose the "Memo and attachments" option and add comments or attached files.
Step 7: After finishing your task, click "Save and Close" at the bottom right. You can choose to either "Save and close" or "Save and start a new entry."
Reconciling your accounts in QuickBooks Online helps keep precise records across your bank and credit card statements.
To reconcile your accounts in QuickBooks Online:
Step 1: Under “Transactions” click on “Reconcile” from the dropdown menu.
Step 2: Upon clicking 'Reconcile,' this screen will be displayed. To connect your accounts for smoother reconciliation in QuickBooks Online, choose 'Connect now.
Step 3: You can then choose a bank or credit card to import all your transactions into Quickbooks.
Step 4: When you choose your bank, you'll be redirected to log in to your online banking or credit card account. After logging in, your transactions will be imported into QuickBooks.
Step 5: For accounts already linked to QuickBooks:
Step 6: QuickBooks will highlight any discrepancies in transaction amounts at the top right, helping you ensure your accounts are balanced and there are no missing transactions.
After reconciling your credit card, you can enter any missing transactions from the statement to balance the difference if necessary. To do this, follow the step-by-step instructions under “Pay down a credit card.”
To effectively categorize credit card payments in QuickBooks, it's important to understand the various categorization options available within the software.
When receiving payments through credit cards, PayPal, or other methods, it’s standard practice to categorize each transaction individually. You can do this by following the standard steps for categorizing credit card payments in QuickBooks Online.
As you continue to use QuickBooks, the software will start to recognize and suggest categories for recurring credit card transactions. You can always modify these suggestions if needed. Additionally, watch for the “Match” option instead of “Add” on certain transactions. This feature helps prevent duplicates for:
Simply verify that the amounts align and then click “Match.”
Mastering the categorization of credit card payments in QuickBooks not only improves your efficiency but also simplifies the process of handling credit card payments in QuickBooks Online.
Suppose you have a receipt for $150, with $90 allocated to office supplies and $60 to travel expenses. In QuickBooks Online, you can easily split this transaction by assigning $90 to the "Office Supplies" category and $60 to "Travel Expenses." This ensures that your financial reports accurately reflect each type of expense.
Step 1: Log into QuickBooks Online.
Step 2: Navigate to “Transactions” on the left sidebar. On clicking “Transactions” you’ll get a drop-down menu; click on “Bank transactions.”
Step 3: This will lead you to the “Banking” page on Quickbooks. This page gives you a summary of all cards and expenses.
Step 4: Select the transaction you want to split. On selecting the transaction, the following drop-down will appear. You can chose to enter additional details you may want to refer to. Once done, click on the “Split” option.
Step 5: On selecting the “Split” option, the following screen will appear. You can add values such as “Category”, “Description”, “Class” and assign “Amount” to each category in the split. Once done, you can click on “Apply and accept.”
Here’s a quick video on how you can split expenses by category on Quickbooks.
By effectively organizing your credit card payments in QuickBooks, you can improve your business's efficiency, accuracy, and operational effectiveness.
Understanding how to categorize credit card payments in QuickBooks is essential, but it’s equally important to be aware of common errors that can lead to inaccuracies in your financial records. Here are the mistakes you should watch out for and how to avoid them:
Mastering the categorization of credit card payments in QuickBooks is not just about avoiding errors; it’s also about implementing best practices that streamline your accounting process and improve accuracy. Here are some key strategies:
By understanding common errors and adhering to these best practices, you can significantly enhance the accuracy of your financial records in QuickBooks. This not only improves your efficiency but also ensures that your financial reports are always reliable and up-to-date.
Using QuickBooks’ reconciliation tool is the most effective way to keep your financial records accurate and balanced. By consistently reconciling your accounts, you’ll streamline your financial management and gain valuable insights into your business’s revenue. Here’s a closer look at some common questions related to categorizing credit card payments in QuickBooks:
Recording credit card payments in QuickBooks involves categorizing the payment as a reduction of your credit card liability, not as an expense. The initial purchase is where the expense is recorded, while the payment simply reduces your liability balance.
A valid credit card expense is any expenditure that is necessary for your business operations and adheres to your company’s spending guidelines. These expenses should be strictly for business purposes and must be supported by receipts to comply with tax regulations.
Business expenses are those that are directly related to the operation of your business. Personal expenses, on the other hand, should be kept entirely separate to maintain accurate financial records and avoid potential tax complications.
In QuickBooks, a credit card payment is treated as a liability payment, as it reduces your outstanding credit card balance. It is not considered a direct business expense, but rather the repayment of funds that were borrowed to cover business expenses.
No, excluding credit card payments, including partial payments, is not advisable. Failing to record these payments can lead to inaccuracies in your financial records and reports, which may cause issues during reconciliation or tax preparation. Ensuring that all credit card transactions are recorded provides a complete and accurate financial overview.
Rewards or cashback earned from credit card payments should be categorized as “Other Income” or placed under a specific rewards category. This approach accurately reflects the benefit received without inflating your expense accounts.
To enhance your Quickbooks online experience, consider integrating with Fyle. Here’s how it can benefit you:
As of August 1, 2024, we’re updating our pricing structure to support our commitment to continuous innovation and providing a seamless, AI-enhanced expense management platform that helps you save time and effort and focus on your business’ success.
In addition to these changes, we want to ensure you’re aware of all the updates we’ve made to our product - from new features that make expense tracking easier than ever to enhancements in user experience.
Our newly-launched Conversational AI is built to ensure expense management becomes even easier for you. Your employees and cardholders can now submit receipts via text messages, saving hours of manual effort, and the unnecessary hoarding of receipts. For you, this means no more incessant follow ups with employees.
Data like amount, date, merchant, category, cost centers etc is automatically extracted from receipts and auto-filled, ensuring quick, accurate coding. Our AI also asks users for additional information like projects and other details you consider mandatory. All they have to do is text us the information and be done with it.
Fyle will match receipts with card transactions that automatically flow into Fyle in real-time (learn more below), and save hours of manual reconciliation effort.
Managing your business credit cards and ensuring all transactions are reconciled before tax time is hard. It generally involves hours of downloading multiple bank statements, collecting receipts, manually matching them, and verifying data.
Fyle’s direct integrations with Visa, Mastercard, and American Express, coupled with our ability to easily collect and automatically match receipts via text, solve just this. Fyle is the only expense management software today that enables businesses to get a real-time view of how and where employees spend from their company cards.
Right from our first-of-its-kind real-time integration with Visa in July 2022 and Mastercard in April 2023, to our direct integration with American Express in April 2024, we’re committed to giving you a seamless software experience on any credit card program you already use.
Fyle joined American Express’ list of partners that allow Business and Corporate Cardholders to issue unlimited, on-demand virtual Cards, linked to your existing card program. Establish specific controls for each on-demand virtual Card payment, including spending limits, and expiration dates, to ensure compliance. Customers can take advantage of the American Express billing cycle to utilize cash on hand for their business until their Card payment is due.
Nobody wants to deal with expense reports - they’re tedious, time-consuming and just a hassle. That’s why we help you automate the entire process. Once your employees have submitted their expenses via Text Messages, Gmail, Outlook, Slack, or our Mobile App, we’ll create an expense report and submit it. You can schedule this process on a weekly, monthly, or on a custom basis, and we’ll take care of the rest.
One of the major challenges with expense management is getting employees to fill in important data to accurately code the expense. With Fyle, not only does our AI-based engine automatically extract information from the receipt, but also auto-fills other details with features like merchant-based expense rules.
With these rules, expense fields like Category, Project, Purpose etc, can be automatically filled in based on the Merchant that has been identified from the card transaction or receipt, reducing the dependence on employees, eliminating human errors, and the need for repetition. For example, you could create a rule that says, If the Merchant name contains ‘Uber’, then set Category to ‘Taxi’.
We've introduced a powerful feature - Dependent Fields, that allows users to control values in one field based on another. For example, you can track Project-dependent fields like Cost Codes and Cost Types easily.
If you’re a construction firm or a service-based company that works on a project basis, you can now track every detail related to a project expense, and simplify accounting.
Here's how it works: if an employee selects Project A, only the Cost Centers associated with Project A appear. This means employees no longer need to remember which Cost Centers align with each project.
While reimbursing employees for business-related travel, you need to adhere to IRS guidelines and deduct the regular commute distance, a task prone to errors and time-consuming manual calculations. Fyle's Commute Deduction feature aims to be the antidote to these challenges, providing a seamless and automated solution.
Users can enter their home and work locations, and choose to deduct commute for one-way or two-way travel every time they add a mileage expense. Employers can rest assured that reimbursements align precisely with business-related mileage, preventing overpayment due to personal commute distances. This not only enhances tax compliance but also contributes to significant cost savings for organizations.
New integrations with QuickBooks Desktop, TravelPerk, MS Dynamics and more!
We’ve introduced new accounting integrations with QuickBooks Desktop (one of our most requested!), Sage 300 Construction & Real Estate (Beta), Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, and TravelPerk! Eliminate the time spent on manual data entry and verification, and automate expense sync.
QuickBooks Desktop
We launched an IIF-file based integration with QuickBooks Desktop to help you automatically sync expense data between the two platforms. This has become one of the fastest growing integrations! Export reimbursable and credit card expenses as Bills, Journal Entries, Credit Card Purchases, and map data like Categories, Employees, Vendors, Projects to make sure expenses are coded accurately.
Sage 300 CRE (Beta)
For construction and real estate firms using Sage 300 CRE, our direct integration is now available in beta. From easy expense export, to mapping of dimensions like GL Codes, Employees, Projects, Job Codes, Cost Codes, Cost Types and more, the integration simplifies construction accounting.
TravelPerk
For customers who use TravelPerk to make and manage travel bookings, we released a direct, bi-directional integration with TravelPerk. For any bookings made on the TravelPerk platform, expenses are created automatically on Fyle, with the receipt and other details automatically filled in. Add and map payment profiles, streamline credit card reconciliation for cards used for bookings, and more.
At Fyle, we’re constantly working to make a better platform that helps businesses like you put expense management on auto-pilot. As a reflection of our commitment to deliver a best-in-class experience, we’re increasing our prices starting August 1st, 2024. We look forward to continuing to build new and exciting features, incorporate customer feedback, and enhancing our offering to help you grow.
Have you ever returned from a business trip with a mountain of receipts and a sinking feeling of dread about the travel expense reports you’d have to submit?
Well, you’re not alone. Sadly, a travel expense report (T&E report) is the key to ensuring your reimbursements arrive on time. We’ll tell you how you can make the process easier and even let you in on a little secret–that you’d never have to spend another second on it ever again.
How? Read on to find out.
Think of a T&E report as a detailed log of your business travel expenses. It documents everything you spent on your trip–from flights, hotels, meals and miscellaneous expenses–for reimbursement by your employer.
It also serves as a record-keeping tool for the company, ensuring there’s proper visibility into spend and compliance with company policies.
A typical T&E report includes the following sections:
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Travel expense reports are more than a documentation hurdle–they’re really the cornerstone of financial discipline, transparency, and compliance within your organisation. Here’s why they matter:
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Conquering travel expense reports doesn’t have to be a battle. Here are some tips you can use:
Or use the ultimate choice, a travel expense report software. You can automate the entire process to save yourself (and your company) time and money.
Templates can be a helpful starting point, but let's delve deeper and explore just how they’d stand up against a travel expense report software.
The age-old question: Should I use a free travel expense report template or pay for travel expense report software? But did you know that a free expense report template might be costing you more than you realise?
Travel expense report templates are free and readily available online, making them a seemingly attractive option. They’re simple and the perfect choice for an organization's most basic needs. However, they can be time-consuming (manual data entry), prone to errors, and cumbersome for frequent travelers.
Did you know? The average expense report takes a massive 20 minutes to process.
But this is just the tip of the iceberg. Here’s a breakdown of the true time cost when travel expense reports are processed manually:
The Math Doesn’t Lie. That’s a total of 20 minutes per claim on average. But wait, there’s more! According to the Global Business Travel Association, a shocking 19% of all expense reports contain errors. And correcting each one takes an additional 18 minutes! Suddenly, that 20-minute claim balloons to a 38-minute ordeal.
Do you feel the time drain? It’s not just you. Imagine the productivity lost for both employees and your finance team. This inefficiency translates to real costs. GBTA found the average expense report costs a staggering $58 to process (and it’s likely that the number is even higher today.)
Let’s crunch these numbers together:
Imagine a company processing an average of 30 expense reports per month. Without errors, that's roughly $21,600 spent annually on the reporting process.
However, factor in those error corrections, and the annual cost jumps to nearly $33,120. That's over $11,500 wasted on fixing mistakes!
And it's important to remember this is just an example for a medium-sized company. For larger organizations with higher volumes of reports, the potential cost drain can be even more significant.
While templates seem like a free option, they’re costing you in hidden ways. Consider this: wouldn’t your time and money be spent focusing on core business functions?
Now, why is this the superior alternative? Because it can automate the entire process for you at just $11:99 a month. But what does this really mean?
A travel expense report software doesn't just save time, it saves money. Imagine the cumulative effect of automating receipt collection, eliminating errors, streamlining approvals, and boosting employee productivity.
Travel expense reports don’t have to be a source of stress. By understanding the purpose, components, and available tools, you can easily navigate the process.
While free templates can help you get started, exploring a travel expense report software is a no-brainer for growing organizations looking for better efficiency and cost savings.
Schedule a demo today to see how Fyle can help your travel expense reporting process!
Smart spending habits go hand-in-hand with efficient reporting. Here are some things you can do:
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This can vary depending on your company’s specific travel policy, so it’s always best to check their guidelines first. Generally, acceptable expenses fall under these categories:
Pro tip: When in doubt, err on the side of caution and save all receipts. You can always clarify with your finance team later.
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This varies by company, but it’s typically within 30 days of your trip’s completion. Some companies might offer shorter deadlines (like 15 days) of een allow for extensions under specific circumstances. Check with your company’s travel policy or finance department for their specific timeframe.
Inform your manager or finance team as soon as possible. Depending on the company policy, they might require an explanation or ask for alternative documentation (like credit card statements) to verify the expense.
Imagine this: you have a business trip coming up to New York City, the most expensive U.S. city for business travelers, with a daily average cost of $541.
But instead of planning the trip, you’re drowning in a sea of flight options, hotel comparisons and car rental quotes.
Enter corporate travel management, your ticket to an easy–boarding pass?
Corporate travel management (CTM) is your one-stop shop for all things business travel. It’s a program that helps companies streamline the entire travel process, from booking flights and hotels to managing expenses and ensuring employee safety.
A corporate travel manager is the mastermind behind your smooth travel experience. They’re experts who design and manage your company’s travel program. They negotiate deals with airlines and hotels (remember, business travelers are highly valuable to airlines!), handle bookings, and provide support to traveling employees.
Absolutely! Here’s why:
CTM programs negotiate corporate rates and track expenses, saving you big bucks. Did you know that while business travelers only make up 12% of airline passengers, they account for 75% of an airline's revenue on some flights?
Corporate travel management programs help you tap into those corporate discounts.
No more endless searches! Employees can book flights, hotels, and car rentals through a user-friendly online platform or app.
Imagine the time saved compared to the pre-internet days, when business travelers took 405 million long-distance trips a year in the U.S., mostly by car for destinations under 250 miles!
Corporate travel management programs prioritise employee safety with features like travel alerts and emergency assistance.
Corporate travel management programs typically charge a small fee based on transaction volume or a retainer model. But guess what? The savings they generate often outweigh the cost.
Let’s break it down with an example:
Scenario: Imagine your company takes 100 business trips per year, costing an average of $2,000 per trip (including flights, hotels, and car rentals). This translates to a total annual travel spend of $200,000 ($2,000/trip * 100 trips).
CTM fee: A CTM program might charge a fee of 2% per transaction. So, for your 100 trips, the CTM fee would be $4,000 ($2,000/trip * 100 trips * 2%).
Savings potential: Here's where CTM programs shine. Through negotiating corporate rates and optimizing travel spend, a CTM program could potentially save your company 10% on travel costs. In this example, that translates to $20,000 in annual savings ($200,000 * 10%).
The math: Even after factoring in the CTM fee, you come out ahead:
Yes, but with a safety net! Most programs allow employees to book within the company's travel policy through the CTM platform. This ensures they get the best rates while adhering to company guidelines.
CTM programs negotiate corporate rates with travel suppliers and track expenses to optimize your budget. Think of it as having a travel connoisseur in your corner!
Business travel can come with risks, especially for international travel which saw a massive decline during COVID (78.8% drop in U.S. business tourist arrivals from overseas in 2020).
An excellent corporate travel management program provides features like real-time traveler tracking, emergency response services, and travel advice to keep your employees safe. Imagine your employees getting stranded due to some outbreak in the future–a CTM program can help locate them and arrange assistance.
CTM programs help ensure employees follow your travel policy and provide clear reports on travel spend, allowing you to identify cost-saving opportunities.
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Now that you're armed with this knowledge, you can implement a CTM program and transform your business travel experience. Here are some next steps:
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A travel expense management software is the unsung hero of your CTM program. It goes beyond simply tracking receipts–it's a powerful tool that helps you develop, implement, and enforce your travel policy. Here's how:
Corporate Travel Management programs are fantastic, but they're like a luxury car without an engine. They save you money, streamline processes, and prioritize employee safety, but for peak performance, you need a travel and expense management software.
That’s where Fyle comes in. Fyle automates receipt collection, expense report submission, expense reimbursements, enforces travel policies and provides valuable spending insights.
The result? Streamlined processes, optimized costs, and happy employees.
Ready to take your CTM program to the next level? See Fyle in action! Sign up for a demo today and experience the future of business travel.
Juggling business trips can be a nightmare–from booking flights and hotels to managing receipts and keeping track of expenses. But fear not; a whole arsenal of business travel management software exists to streamline this process and make your life easier.
Let’s explore some of the top contenders to help you choose the perfect fit for your company’s needs.
A business travel booking tool goes beyond simply finding flights and hotels. They offer a one-stop shop for booking, managing, and tracking all aspects of your business travel.
Imagine managing every aspect of your business travel in a single, user-friendly platform. That’s the magic of TravelPerk! This all-in-one business travel management solution streamlines your booking process to ensure that everything from flights, trains, and hotels is brought under one dashboard and ensures compliance with your company’s travel policy.
Their handy mobile app keeps you organized and in control, providing real-time flight updates, paperless confirmations of all your bookings, and easy access to your entire itinerary.
TravelPerk also understands that flexibility is key in the business world. That’s why their FlexiPerk feature allows you to cancel trips easily and get 80% of your money back–no questions asked!
Pricing
TravelPerk offers a free "Starter" plan with five monthly bookings, perfect for small businesses or trying out the platform. Paid memberships provide more features and increased booking limits. Here's a quick breakdown:
Did you know TravelPerk integrates directly with Fyle, a travel expense management software? This means:
Airbnb for Work goes beyond traditional hotels, offering a curated selection of unique spaces around the world that cater specifically to business travelers. This platform provides a win-win for both employers and employees. Companies can leverage Airbnb for Work’s suite of tools to streamline booking, manage travel spend, and ensure compliance with company policies.
Employees can access various accommodation options, from modern apartments to charming boutique hotels, all designed to foster productivity and comfort during business trips.
Pricing
TravelBank joins the ranks of business travel management superstars, offering a comprehensive platform to streamline your corporate travel experience. Similar to TravelPerk, TravelBank is a one-stop shop for booking flights, hotels, and ground transportation for your employees. It goes beyond booking though, offering features to manage expenses, enforce travel policy compliance, and prioritize traveler safety–all within a user-friendly platform.
TravelBank boasts seamless integration with various business tools, including Slack, meaning you can book trips or submit expense reports directly from your preferred communication platform. This level of convenience translates to real time-saving benefits.
TravelBank empowers businesses with features like cost-saving tools, streamlined processes for booking and expense management, and clear visibility into travel spend for informed budgeting.
With its feature-rich platform and focus on saving you time, money, and stress, TravelBank is a strong contender worth considering for your business travel management needs.
Pricing
Egencia is a seasoned veteran in the world of business travel management. They offer a comprehensive suite of tools designed to elevate your corporate travel experience far beyond just booking flights, hotels, and ground transportation.
Egencia boasts features like itinerary management, robust reporting for informed decision-making, and duty-of-care services that prioritize traveler safety with features like 24/7 customer support and real-time travel alerts.
Egencia's extensive industry experience and global network of travel providers make it a trusted choice for businesses of all sizes. They understand the importance of traveler well-being and offer features that keep your team informed, supported, and on track throughout their journeys.
Their focus on experience, expertise, and traveler well-being makes them a compelling choice for managing your corporate travel program with confidence.
Pricing
Travel expense reports can be a nightmare for both employees and finance teams. Travel expense management tools streamline the process, ensuring accurate record-keeping, policy compliance, and efficient expense reimbursements. These tools can handle a mix of corporate and business credit cards, cash advances and facilitate compliance with tax regulations. Here are some of our top contenders:
Fyle emerges as a champion in the travel expense management category. This user-friendly platform automates the entire process, transforming tedious data entry and receipt sorting into a breeze.
Fyle accepts receipts through various methods, such as text message, email, or its mobile app. Its intelligent data extraction then automatically creates expense reports, minimizing manual work and saving valuable time for both employees and finance teams.
Designed for seamless integration, Fyle connects with popular accounting software, allowing for effortless expense categorization and streamlined reporting. This eliminates the need for manual data transfer and ensures all your financial data is consistently organized.
Fyle also offers an additional perk: an integration with TravelPerk. This powerful combo allows you to manage both the booking process and all related expenses within a single, unified system.
Fyle effectively streamlines the entire travel expense experience, keeping your team focused on core business activities and free from the burden of manual expense reporting.
Pricing
If you're looking for something that isn't feature-packed like Fyle but can do simple tasks like receipt management, Shoeboxed is a good option. Shoeboxed offers two ways of managing receipts: you can either send them in a prepaid envelope to their processing facility or use its mobile app to scan them.
By using OCR, they can scan and convert the paper receipt into a digital version that is also searchable. This makes tracking and organizing receipts easier. Shoeboxed also integrates with Wave accounting, Xero, FreshBooks, Intuit, and more.
Pricing
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Tripit is a travel planner app that consolidates bookings into an itinerary. As soon as you book a flight, hotel, or other travel plan, you need to forward all the confirmation emails to their email. Tripit will automatically create an itinerary you can access while on the go.
Tripit Pro also has a seat and fare tracker that can help you choose the best seats and update you about dropping fares after you book.
Pricing
Google Travel is an aggregate site that consolidates all elements of trip planning into one platform. You can book flights, find a hotel, or check out vacation rentals without switching between multiple sites and tabs.
Input your destination, add your dates, and let Google search for you. It will help you compare dates, set notifications in case of price drops, and even show when it's on or off-season.
The best part is that since all your bookings will be made using your Gmail, everything will be automatically added to your Google account and itinerary.
Booking.com for business is a go-to website for all your business travel bookings and management. You get exclusive business rates, cash in on loyalty points, and 24/7 support from CWT, one of the leading travel management companies.
It's free to use and has over 3 million listed properties across 150,000 destinations.
PackPoint is an easy-to-use app that helps you organize your travel luggage based on the type of visit, the number of days, and the activities planned.
For example, if you're going on a business trip, you can input the location and the number of days, and PackPoint will automatically create a list of things you need to pack to make your travel less stressful. You can also customize the list and share it with others.
PackPoint integrates with TripIt and can auto-create packing lists based on travels you booked using TripIt.
Pricing
The app costs $2.99
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These tools address businesses' specific challenges with booking travel and managing travel expenses. However, there's no universal solution. Start by identifying the major bottlenecks in your business travel management process and the essential features you need. Once you have this clarity, review the tools available here to determine which best suits your business. Take advantage of demos, weigh the pros and cons, and select the tool to effectively streamline your travel expense management.
Double-checking your expenses doesn’t sound all that difficult, and it isn’t. For the individual, at least. When it comes to large businesses with hundreds or even thousands of people using company assets, keeping your financial accounting straight becomes infinitely more complex.
That’s why we’ve put together a guide to expense reconciliation. How it works, the potential roadblocks, and how to make it that much easier.
Expense reconciliation is the process of comparing and matching financial records related to business expenses. It involves checking that all the money spent by a business aligns with the recorded expenses in its accounting system. This process helps identify errors, discrepancies, or fraudulent activities.
While expense reconciliation may not be so difficult for small start-ups or self-employed individuals, larger businesses have so much more going on across different branches and departments to the point they might need enterprise collaboration software just to keep track of everything.
There are a lot of important reasons to reconcile your expenses, from conducting end-of-year reports and tax returns to monitoring budget and expenses. It’s essential to prevent things like:
As such, it’s in your best interest to make sure you’re reconciling expenses correctly.
The need to double-check figures is as old as the concept of business itself. As such, companies have been doing manual expense reconciliation for a long time. Some still use paper records, meaning they literally have to go over the books.
These days, however, many organizations use spreadsheets customized with automated functions to record and monitor financial reporting. For example, the figures from things like expense claims or company credit card statements get entered into the database for easy cross-referencing.
This helps streamline things and limit human error compared to the pen-and-paper approach, but there’s still a large amount of manual work involved.
There are a few different kinds of expense reconciliation to keep track of. Most are business-related, covering the various ways companies spend money.
Personal reconciliation is the only non-business-based entry on this list. An example of personal reconciliation would be checking tax-deductible expenses against your receipts when filing your tax return. Compared to the sheer variety of business expenses, personal financial accounting is much simpler.
Regular business expenses include things universal to most businesses, like payroll and inventory costs. Other needs are industry-specific. For example, the budget to promote a holiday company’s travel packages or safety equipment for construction workers.
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Reconciling customer expenses helps you stay aware of outstanding debts. While that’s more a matter of income than expense, it’s still an important part of broader budgeting concerns. You’ll also need to factor in any refunds to avoid accidentally creating imaginary profit or concealing real earnings.
Vendor reconciliation means checking your financial statements against those of your suppliers. For example, recreational spaces like theme parks typically have vendors supplying food, drinks, or even small events. The fact that each business has its own record-keeping theoretically means it’s easy to double-check your work.
Bank statements and account histories are valuable fallbacks if your internal record-keeping fails. Your bank will have full records of all transactions related to your company’s expense accounts in the event you otherwise can’t resolve a discrepancy.
Expense reconciliation is the cornerstone of financial health for any business. It’s more than just a numbers game; it’s a strategic tool that drives informed-decision making.
By accurately matching expenses to income, you create a clear financial snapshot. This helps you understand your business’s profitability, cash flow, and overall financial performance.
Regular reconciliation is your first line of defense against financial irregularities. It helps uncover discrepancies, identify potential fraud, and ensure the accuracy of your financial records.
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With reliable expense data, you can make informed decisions about budgeting, cost-cutting, and resource allocation. This empowers you to optimize your business operations and maximize profitability.
Accurate expense records are essential for meeting tax obligations and passing audits. Reconciliation ensures you have the necessary documentation to support your financial claims.
Effective expense reconciliation involves the following key steps:
Gather all relevant expense data, including receipts, invoices, credit card statements, and employee expense reports. Ensure the data is complete, accurate, and accessible.
Review collected data for errors, inconsistencies, or missing information. Verify that all expenses are accurately coded and have supporting documentation.
Compare expense data to accounting records, bank statements, and other relevant financial information. Identify and resolve any discrepancies.
Analyze the reconciled data to identify trends, patterns, or potential cost-saving opportunities. Use this information to improve financial performance. Fyle makes this quite simple:
You can analyse spend patterns across business credit card and reimbursable expenses, compare it across different time periods so you can make better decisions.
Although it sounds straight-forward in theory, expense reconciliation in practice involves a lot of potential obstacles and frustrations. While it’s hard to predict everything that could possibly go wrong, here are some of the issues businesses regularly encounter.
While automated, streamlined software is fast becoming the norm, many businesses still rely on old-fashioned written record-keeping to at least some degree. Unfortunately, that means you have to painstakingly pore through the numbers by eye.
It’s one thing to manually record a single stream of regular expenses you know to expect along the way, like payroll or employee insurance. It’s another thing entirely to track down every one-off expense, like legal expenses, or that outbound sales strategy workshop that not many staff attended.
Even partial automation may not actually save you that much time, as you still end up having to re-record a lot of information in a digitized form.
Again, if all you had to do was check transaction records from a single source, corporate expense reconciliation wouldn’t be nearly such a headache. In medium-to-large businesses, however, there might be any number of people with company credit cards or expense account access in some capacity.
Financial accountants must often spend a lot of time chasing up every last bill and invoice for discretionary expenses to dot the Is and cross the Ts. In situations like these, you’re at the mercy of the quality of your record-keeping system. If it’s paper-based, documentation could be missing or damaged.
The other issue with having so many people contribute to the mountain of expense information is that finances might not all be tracked to the same standards. People can easily forget to record payments or to carry the one in their sums. In fact, issues like these are why expense reconciliation is necessary to begin with.
Even if employees provide all the necessary financial information, they might record it in different formats, or in a way that’s unclear. All of this makes manual digitization that much more of a pain.
With data from so many different sources in so many formats, you need to convert it all into a unified standard. This might mean using specialized software, or simply putting it all into a spreadsheet. Even so, converting large amounts of finance data from one format to another can be as time-consuming as actually studying it.
Conversion aside, you need to be able to store your data too, whether physically or digitally. On top of that, as your business grows, you might reach the limitations of how much data your system can adequately process.
Expense reconciliation is time-consuming and often challenging for businesses, especially if done manually. With Fyle’s expense management software, you can integrate with any business credit card, to simplify the expense reconciliation process.
Here’s how we can help:
With the leaps and bounds of computer technology over the past couple of decades, you’d be forgiven for wondering why companies haven’t embraced it for financial accounting and expense reconciliation wholeheartedly.
People can often be resistant to change. If something still works, why swap it out for something you’re not used to?
On top of that, there are tangible real-world resource costs associated with any corporate systems migration, such as licensing and installation costs, lost productivity during adjustment, and so on.
Even so, the benefits of a modern expense reconciliation process are too big to ignore. By changing the way your people work, you can free up their time and energy for what really matters.
Aside from how slow they are to use, paper records are awfully perishable. So, not only are digitized records more efficient thanks to search bar utilities and keywords, they’re much safer too.
Sure, data loss, theft, and corruption are their own risks. But it’s much easier to have multiple virtual copies of your records stored in their own cyber-secure spaces.
On top of that, digitization is necessary to enable the next step in modernizing your expense reconciliation.
With virtual financial records, it’s possible to automate both the addition and analysis of financial data. Using a machine learning algorithm, you can check financial records against each other much faster than you would by eye.
We’re already seeing how AI customer service, for example, helps individuals complete or automate transactions and handle their finances. These sorts of algorithms can also help automate record-keeping for things like expense reports and company credit cards too. In theory, this helps to prevent human error and oversights.
As you digitize and automate financial accounting processes, you’ll find it easier to decentralize the burden of responsibility. Rather than your accounting team having to scramble to ensure receipt compliance and accuracy for every spending employee in the business, those staff members get the tools and knowledge necessary to supply their own record-keeping.
Expense reporting is the process of submitting expense claims for reimbursement, while expense reconciliation involves verifying and matching those expenses to accounting records.
The frequency of expense reconciliation depends on your business size and industry. Many companies reconcile expenses monthly, but some may require more frequent reconciliation for better control.
Some metrics to consider while reconciling expenses include:
Reconciliation time is the average time it takes to reconcile a specific period’s expenses.
How to track?
Calculate the time spent on data collection, verification, matching, and analysis for reach reconciliation period.
The percentage of errors found during the reconciliation process.
How to track?
Monitor the number of discrepancies found and divide it by the total number of transactions processed.
The average value of individual expenses.
How to track?
Calculate the total expenses for a period and divide by the number of transactions.
The percentage of revenue spent on expenses.
How to track?
Divide total expenses by total revenue for a specific period.
While corporate credit cards offer convenience and efficiency for businesses, managing them effectively can be a daunting task. Without proper oversight, corporate cards can lead to uncontrolled spending, fraudulent activities, and administrative headaches.
To help you out, we’ve crafted this guide to delve into the nitty gritty of efficient corporate credit card management, explore some best practices, and provide you with insights on how to choose the right card issuer.
By the end of this guide, you’ll have a better idea of how you can optimize your company’s spending, enhance financial control, and regain some of that lost sanity.
Corporate credit card management is the systematic process of managing and controlling the use of company-issued credit cards. It involves setting clear spending policies, monitoring card usage, reconciling statements, and ensuring compliance with financial regulations.
Effective management is crucial for maintaining financial health, optimizing cash flow, and preventing fraud.
Corporate credit card management is essential for several reasons:
Define what expenses are eligible for corporate cards, set spending limits, and outline approval processes.
Select a card issuer that aligns with your business needs, offers robust security features, and provides excellent customer support. Bank-issued cards often excel in these areas due to their established infrastructure and regulatory compliance.
Utilize a credit card expense management software to automate expense tracking, track company card spending, and generate detailed reports.
As your business evolves, revisit spending policies to ensure they remain relevant and effective.
Educate employees about card usage, expense reporting procedures, and fraud prevention.
Monitor card activity in real time and receive notifications for unusual or suspicious transactions.
Review and reconcile credit card statements to identify errors, unauthorized charges, and potential discrepancies.
Perform regular audits to assess card usage, and compliance with policies, and identify areas for improvement.
Maximize the value of your corporate card program by taking advantage of rewards and perks offered by the card issuer.
Emphasize the importance of responsible card usage and encourage employees to report any issues promptly.
While managing multiple corporate cards can be complex, here’s one of the easiest things you can do:
With Fyle you can have all your corporate card transactions in one dashboard. Here’s how:
While fintech companies have disrupted the financial industry, bank-issued corporate credit cards still offer several advantages:
Implementing robust security measures is crucial. This includes setting strong passwords, utilizing cardholder verification (CVV) codes, and enabling fraud alerts.
Regularly monitoring card activity and reporting suspicious transactions promptly can also help prevent unauthorized charges.
Contact your card issuer immediately to dispute the charge. Gather all necessary documentation, such as receipts and transaction details. Work closely with your company's finance department to resolve the issue promptly.
Consider factors such as annual fees, rewards programs, interest rates, and customer support when selecting a corporate credit card. Evaluate the card's alignment with your business's spending habits and industry-specific needs. Bank-issued cards often offer a wider range of features and benefits tailored to businesses of all sizes.
Ideally, corporate credit card statements should be reconciled monthly to ensure accuracy and identify any discrepancies. However, for businesses with high transaction volumes, more frequent reconciliation may be necessary.
But with tools like Fyle, credit card transactions are automatically reconciled as soon as employee submit their receipts via text!
Common red flags include unauthorized charges, unusual purchase amounts, transactions in unfamiliar locations, and discrepancies between receipts and card statements. Be vigilant and report any suspicious activity immediately.
As your business grows, the number of company-owned cards is likely to increase as well.
Using an expense management software can simplify corporate credit card management with features like real-time transaction feeds, text-message receipt submission, real-time spend visibility, and policy compliance.
Schedule a demo today to see how Fyle can simplify corporate credit card management!
