After revamping its travel booking platform, Deem has opened
up its application programming interface to expense management firms. Chrome
River is the first to connect through the Open Expense API, according to Deem
president and COO John Rizzo.
In April, when Deem launched the Work
Fource booking platform, Rizzo said the company would be more "laser focused
on travel" and has left other businesses that were "hard to
understand," such as its loyalty offering and its flower procurement
business. He maintained that Deem was "not walking away" from expense
and would continue to sell its product to the market but also would also
partner with other expense providers.
Now, when a traveler from a Chrome River client books on
Work Fource, the data flows into Chrome River for expense reporting. Deem's bidirectional
API also allows Deem to take data in if the expense firm has the technology, as
Chrome River does. "If a company wants to sign up with both of us, then
they don't have to send a list of all employees and the attributes of those
employees to both companies," said Chrome River CEO Alan Rich. "This
makes it easier to set up as employees are hired, terminated or move
departments." He noted that expense providers cover a more comprehensive
roster because most companies have more employees submitting expenses than just
the travelers.
Importing expense data to Deem's platform also sets the
stage for a more sophisticated benefit for travel programs: Deem plans to
aggregate expense and booking data for a real-time travel cost summary. Visible
to travelers as they book, it will encourage better spending decisions, Rizzo
said. The travel cost summary could indicate to the traveler that he or she is
nearing his or her monthly budget, for example, or a company could use the
travel cost summary for gamification.
"If
you look at our data stack, we're sitting on a lot of data, which can be mined
and reported in real time for the traveler or published offline for the travel
manager," Rizzo said. Still, until Deem captures more comprehensive data, expense
data is a useful complement, he said.