A CFO Perspective: The role of AI in revolutionising travel and expense management

How AI Is Revolutionising Travel and Expense Management for Finance Teams

Not so long ago, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and business finance management felt like two very separate conversations. But today, AI is embedded in almost every part of the business process – including areas that employees interact with every day, like travel and expense (T&E) management.

At SAP, the integration of AI isn’t new. In fact, according to Gina McNamara, SAP’s CFO for Asia Pacific and Japan (APJ), SAP has been building AI into its products for years. And one area where AI is making a significant impact for customers is SAP Concur, the company’s travel and expense solution.

Why AI Is Changing Travel and Expense Management

Ask any business traveller or finance team, and they’ll tell you: managing expenses is a time-consuming task prone to errors, non-compliance, and even fraud. SAP Concur, powered by AI, is helping solve these challenges.

“SAP Concur is our travel and expense technology that’s always been quite ahead of its time. It can pair publicly available Gen AI results with your travel and expense data to create a personalised, enhanced AI experience for users. The embedded AI can also capture and pre-populate expense details, removing the manual entry” said Gina.

For example, instead of sitting down at the end of a trip to sift through receipts and manually upload them, employees can have their expense details pre-populated. AI can read and understand the receipts, match them to corporate card transactions, and even categorise the expenses according to company policy.

How AI Improves Compliance and Reduces Fraud Risk

Compliance is a major concern for finance teams. AI in SAP Concur offers enhanced auditing functionality, making it easier to detect anomalies or potentially fraudulent activity before it becomes an issue. By automating these checks, businesses can ensure stronger compliance without adding to the workload of their finance teams.

As Gina explains, “SAP Concur automates so many of the processes that can cause fraud and other issues in a business.” This means teams can focus less on policing expenses and more on analysing spend data to drive strategic decisions.

“It knows all the compliance, regulations and policies, so you don‘t have to double check. I think that‘s gold for a CFO” says Gina.

Creating a Smarter, More Personal Travel Experience

One of the most exciting advancements is how generative AI is enhancing the traveller experience itself. Gina shares that with SAP Concur, users can soon say, “I want to travel to Japan and I‘d like to take the usual airline and stay at the usual hotel,” and the AI will handle the booking based on company policy and personal preferences. This eliminates the back-and-forth of searching multiple options and ensures compliance with travel guidelines automatically.

Business Impact: Better Insights, Faster Reporting

Beyond user convenience, AI in SAP Concur has significant financial benefits. Faster, more accurate expense reporting helps businesses manage cashflow better, identify spending patterns, and reduce costs. AI can also optimise payment scheduling, invoice processing, and reconciliations to improve liquidity management.

According to Gina, AI is helping empower her finance team with time and insights.  “Having generative AI available in a T&E tool is super cool. The way AI powers SAP Concur is a great example of the human benefits that then integrate over to the financials. I definitely use it myself, and that means that I don‘t have to ask my EA to do things. That frees her up to help me with other different things. People are only just realising how much time we traditionally spend on these type of tasks”

AI + SAP Concur: Driving Simplicity, Accuracy, and Strategic Value

The power of AI in T&E management goes beyond automation. It’s about creating intelligent processes that empower employees and finance teams to focus on what really matters: delivering strategic insights, supporting business goals, and driving financial performance.

If you’re still spending hours managing expenses manually, it may be time to rethink how AI can transform the way your business manages travel and expenses.