After toning down expectations for its first quarter, ended March 31, due to a "challenging sales environment," automated expense management provider Extensity Inc. of Emeryville, Calif., earlier this month announced a mutual customer referral agreement with Fort Washington, Pa.-based Interplx Technologies, an outsourcer of document and payment processing, reimbursement, auditing and customer support.
The agreement allows Extensity customers to use Interplx's automated processing and payment, including e-mail notification to the employee. Interplx also audits, images and archives reports and receipts. "We recognize the need for multiple payment processing and manual auditing options within our customer base," according to Extensity CEO Bob Spinner. Pharmaceutical companies Merck and AstraZeneca are among the customers that have integrated the two product lines.
Meanwhile, Cambridge, Mass.-based 170 Systems Inc. earlier this week named AT&T, RCN Corp. and Granite Services Inc. as companies that have taken advantage of its document management service in conjunction with the Internet Expenses function of the Oracle E-Business Suite. "Automating this process and eliminating the challenge of relying on paper-based receipt backup can reduce processing costs by up to 75 percent, slash reimbursement cycle time dramatically and improve compliance with corporate travel and expense policies," said Karl Buttner, president and CEO of 170 Systems, in a press statement.
The four-month-old Extensity-Interplx arrangement grew out of the customer relationship with Merck, which previously used Interplx with a different front-end software. Merck now has more than 4,000 users on the system, with more than 15,000 to come. AstraZeneca, with well over 10,000 users, switched from an outsourced solution provided by Gelco Expense Management partly to take advantage of Extensity's offline data entry feature, said an Extensity executive.
Quicker payment processing is particularly important as such corporate charge card vendors as American Express have tightened the screws on late-payment penalties.
Also, according to Christa Degnan, senior analyst with The Aberdeen Group in Boston, receipt imaging is "a big area of differentiation" for T&E expense management providers that "will become a 'must have.' " Traditional processes, she said, do not allow accounts payable or other personnel to easily identify the granular details in paper receipts. Both of the pharmaceutical clients passed on Interplx's Web-based imaged-receipt service, for which it charges extra, but Interplx CEO Chuck Buckner said about half of his clients choose the more expensive service, largely to facilitate the investigation of employee expense behavior.
"This is a standard offering from us," said Eden Prairie, Minn.-based Gelco Information Network CEO Jon Klem. "I think these announcements really underscore that they are trying to be more like Gelco," he said. "We support document services for a number of the different front-end applications, mostly enterprise resource planning or homegrown systems. But for us to bolt our back-end offerings to our competitors' front ends is more of a convenience factor than a market strategy." Gelco also is marketing its own front end as part of the Travel Manager offering.
Asked whether his company and new partner Extensity were "trying to be more like Gelco," Interplx's Buckner said, "That would oversimplify. The difference is that when you look at front-end solutions, Extensity has one of the most robust out there. On the back end, where we focus, we offer a much more complete service."
According to a Concur marketing official, the Redmond, Wash.-based expense management provider also works with Interplx and promises soon to offer receipt imaging as a fax-based service. "The Concur relationship is not yet formalized, whereas our relationship with Extensity goes back several months and is more mature. But it's not exclusive," Buckner said.
According to a spokesperson for Bothell, Wash.-based Captura Inc., "It is coincidental timing that everyone seems to be having news about expense documentation management. Many expense vendors are continuing to expand their functionality to increase sales and create differentiation. Captura is always involved in new business alliances and product development to enhance and expand the functionality we provide, and we are looking at the best means of providing expense documentation management."
Pleasanton, Calif.-based PeopleSoft has a partnership with Carlsbad, Calif.-based Bluebird for document management services.