Why companies aren’t switching spend platforms.

Finance leaders told us back in 2022 that they were prioritizing spend management solutions that offered ease to use, time-saving automations, and robust integrations.

Sure, that all sounds great, but some companies still haven’t modernized their spend management. Wondering why?

Well, as far as we can tell, the companies that aren’t switching from outdated platforms like Concur just don’t know:

It seems like these companies are happy to use spreadsheets to manually track budgets and spending, go on without controls that preemptively prevent out-of-policy spend or overspending, and close the books at a snail’s pace.

Ultimately, the companies that aren’t switching spend platforms don’t know how much better life can be with powerful automations and deep integrations to keep all their finances in sync.

So how about the finance leaders who recognize the need to modernize their processes with an integrated card, travel, and spend program? Glad you asked! Here’s why they pushed their companies to switch spend platforms ASAP.

To find out, we partnered with Forrester Consulting to survey 304 global executives in charge of spend management technology at their respective companies. Their top business goal for the next year: Boosting operational efficiency to better manage an increasingly distributed global workforce.

The Forrester study concludes that future- and growth-minded spend management leaders are prioritizing AI-powered platforms with global capabilities. While AI won’t replace your workforce or cater your next offsite, AI-powered solutions like Brex can automate key workflows like populating accounting fields, completing expense reports, and forecasting future spend. Those automations really add up as Brex customers save a combined 300,000+ hours a year.

“The Brex app has been a major gain for us in both user experience and efficiency for T&E,” said Josh Pickles, Head of Global Strategic Sourcing and Procurement at DoorDash. “It’s easy for employees to understand where and how to spend, driving accountability from top to bottom."

Superhuman has also seen a huge efficiency boost since switching to Brex. Their employees are saving upwards of 500 hours a month on expense reporting, thanks in part to the Brex’s app’s intuitive UX.

Oh, and an AI-powered solution can also help you stay on top of local taxes and fees. Talk about a time-, money-, and headache-saver.

Today’s fast-moving organizations cannot afford the errors and poor visibility of manual spend management. Instead, they’re looking to automate processes like compliance, procurement, and reimbursements while increasing efficiency and accuracy.

Finance leaders know that this can only be achieved with AI-powered technologies. When Brex and WBR surveyed 100 finance execs across North America, 71% cited AI as a top priority for driving spend management results over the next 12 months. In turn, 86% consider AI to be one of the top areas they’d prioritize to improve spend management.

Simply put, smart finance and procurement leaders view AI as a lever to gain efficiency and control over company spend. And businesses will realize those automation gains much faster with an AI-powered spend management solution spanning travel, expenses, purchasing, stipends, and more.

SeatGeek, for example, has saved serious time and achieved a near-perfect expense policy compliance rate since switching to Brex.

"Thanks to Brex’s automation capabilities, we can take a program and rules-based approach to our accounting processes instead of manual work,” said Teddy Collins, Vice President of Corporate Finance at SeatGeek. “We've gone from spending over 20 hours on each month-end close for credit cards and reimbursements to under 2 hours. All while achieving an employee compliance rate above 99%. Brex makes it easy by streamlining and automating documentation collection and reviews."

Automation is about more than just saving time — it’s about mitigating the risk of human error. (Even the most thorough accountants and controllers can make a small manual entry mistake, causing a ripple effect of spreadsheet errors.) But, with AI’s ability to process large datasets in an instant, that small mistake is far less likely to happen.

Nearly every company in our T&E survey (98%) said that travel is important to achieving business goals. Still, just 58% said they understand all the fees associated with their current T&E solution. And 42% of respondents cited ease of use as their No. 1 pain point.

It’s no surprise that 77% of those companies say they’re likely or very likely to consider switching to a better T&E management solution this year.

Travel leakage is bound to happen when employees can’t easily access the best fares, schedules, and routes for their business trips. A unified travel and expense management solution provides cost control and a seamless experience for the end user.

“We’ve made a lot of friends in marketing and sales because we’ve made their lives so much easier,” said Ty Barton, Accounting Manager at Signifyd. “Now, when they’re traveling for trade shows, they can focus on prospects and clients instead of tracking all these receipts in their back pocket.”

The bottom line: Employees will stay on budget and in policy when their travel program makes it easy to do so.