SAP Concur reveals 2025 predictions for T&E management
SAP Concur has unveiled its five predictions for travel and expense (T&E) management by the year 2025.
The first prediction by SAP Concur concerns the continued investment in digital systems and security infrastructure. Companies are anticipated to invest in process automation and generative AI to support growth, despite the rising risks associated with data breaches as organisations expand their digital structures. As businesses attempt to balance swift responses to stakeholder demands with security concerns, investment in technological innovation and security infrastructure is projected to be a priority in 2025. Nearly 85% of businesses in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region have reported an increase in cyber budgets, with growing regulations such as those in Singapore, where businesses can face fines of up to 10% of their local annual turnover.
The next prediction is that a return to the office will increase pressure on travel budgets. As inflation slows, there are opportunities to derive more value from travel investments, although financial controllers will face the challenge of maximizing budget efficiency while minimising risk. Tools to ensure compliance and visibility will become essential, with the likelihood that T&E will be managed centrally on one platform. Brett Wheeldon, Vice President of Solutions Consulting, APAC at SAP Concur, stated, "From 2020-2023, circumstances led to dramatically reduced travel activity and companies experienced benefits to their bottom line. Corporate travel is now recovering strongly – according to the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA), the global business travel industry spending is expected to hit a record USD $1.48 trillion this year, with China and the US the two fastest-growing markets. Asia Pacific was the fastest-growing region for corporate travel in 2023, expanding 36% over the year before. With this comes a scramble for visibility and the ability to rapidly adapt and then apply company spend policies. Many organisations, however, are ill-equipped to deliver this change."
SAP Concur's third prediction is the transformation of expense reports into exception reports. AI is expected to increase the automation of repeatable tasks, enabling managers to focus on scrutinising deviations rather than individual transactions. Expense reports will highlight only those transactions that differ from company policy, allowing management to better detect fraud and errors.
The fourth prediction addresses employee scepticism towards AI. While AI holds potential benefits for business operations, staff are expected to view it as an aid rather than a standalone solution. According to the SAP Concur Global Business Travel Survey, 95% of business travellers would consider using AI-powered automation for task support, mostly for pre-trip approvals and itinerary building. Wheeldon adds, "Travel booking is the perfect use case to move away from static cumbersome input forms to a natural language conversation that has the datasets to access information such as corporate travel policies, specific event dates and even travellers' record of travel that may alter policy rules based on frequency of travel."
The final prediction focuses on the demand for improved user experiences. Rising business travel will coincide with higher expectations for real-time updates on potential disruptions. The effects of extreme weather and geopolitical conflicts are increasingly considered in business travel decisions, and employees expect enhanced support through T&E systems in line with an employer's duty of care. Wheeldon noted, "Of course, that aggregated T&E data also provides insight into other areas APAC businesses are becoming more and more focused on, for example, what is the organisation's travel program's carbon footprint, and does the organisation have the tools to reduce that footprint?"
