Expense-reporting software maker Abacus now can ingest
American Express corporate card data without third-party intervention, Abacus
co-founder and CEO Omar Qari said.
While Abacus and Amex are not official partners, Amex set up
a "specific configuration" on its server to allow Abacus to connect
securely and pull transaction data. Amex will exchange the data with Abacus only
when mutual customers approve, an Amex spokesperson said.
Within the Abacus platform, a card manager assigns a certain
card's feed to the employee's Abacus account so the card data automatically
populates the employee's expenses. Abacus can receive the amount spent,
merchant and date, plus Level 3 data like hotel check-in and check-out dates,
origin and destination of flights, classes of hotels and flights, car rental
dates and currency exchange rates. It pulls only posted transactions, not
pending ones.
Abacus categorizes expenses, matches them to receipts,
"corrects" merchant names based on machine learning and compiles a
list of completed or almost complete expenses. The employee reviews and adjusts
these Suggested Expenses and then submits for reimbursement.
Amex is the first financial institution that can feed data
to Abacus, but Qari said Abacus is planning more. "By doing integrations
with the top five to 10 financial institutions, we'll end up covering about 95
percent of corporate card programs," Qari said.
Abacus' 2016 Updates
White-Label Emails:
Since March, Abacus clients have been able to customize emails for their
employees with logos and color schemes.
Faster Workflow: Introduced
in April, the Receipt View module allows administrators to expand receipt images
for quicker viewing and to accelerate their way through reports by typing A to
approve, D to deny and the right arrow key to skip.
User-Friendly
Interfaces: In June, Abacus improved the administrator and user interfaces.
This update also allows users to upload multiple receipts at one time. Additionally,
artificial intelligence learns an administrator's approval behavior and suggests
rules for automatic approvals, rejections and flagging. Abacus said the rules
engine can help administrators reduce the number of expenses requiring action by
80 percent.
Slack: Also in June, Abacus integrated with cloud
collaboration and messaging tool Slack. Travelers can upload receipts to Abacus
through Slack, which notifies administrators that expenses are ready to
approve. Administrators also can approve expenses in the platform.