AI in expense management workflows

Zero-touch spend management

The future of finance is “zero-touch spend management.” Modern expense platforms, powered by self-learning artificial intelligence (AI), go far beyond simple digital document storage. They're designed to automate every step of the process — from the first snapshot of a photo to the final export to the accounting system — and require minimal human intervention. This change increases accuracy and ensures compliance from the time of purchase.

Empowering finance teams through intelligent automation

• Real-time data extraction: Advanced optical character recognition (OCR) and machine learning (ML) automatically capture critical data (supplier, amount, date, VAT) from any receipt or invoice, regardless of format or language.
• Intelligent reconciliation: AI automatically compares receipts with the corresponding credit card transactions, thus eliminating the tedious, manual effort of reconciliation of transactions at the end of the month.
• Enforcing individual policies: The system enforces complex corporate expense policies and country-specific blanket rules before the expenditure is approved, which drastically reduces compliance risks.
• Fraud and anomaly detection: ML algorithms analyze spending patterns to mark suspicious receipts, duplicates, or potential policy violations and protect the company from financial losses.
• Flexible workflows: Approval flows are individually adjusted to represent complex organizational structures. This ensures that expenses are routed correctly and that managers are only notified when there are exceptions. Consequat vulputate pellentesque cursus venenatis egestas.
• Zero-touch: The ultimate goal of AI in expense management is for 80% to 90% of all expenses to go directly from submission to final booking, without a single manual review by the finance team. The AI simply marks outliers and violations for human review.

The mission of these advanced systems is to turn raw financial data into a clean, audit-proof data path. This provides finance departments with crystal-clear management reports and real-time insights into company spending, which enables faster and better decision making.

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At hotdok, we believe in the power of innovation and individualization. Our mission is to equip companies with the tools and strategies they need to thrive in an ever-evolving digital landscape and ensure their success at every stage of their journey.

The automated end-to-end workflow

The integration of AI fundamentally changes the daily workflow for every employee — from submitter to CFO. Employees simply take a photo; the AI does the rest. For finance, this means a shift in focus from data entry and tedious checks to strategic analysis and cash flow forecasting.

Operational processes with AI-supported task completion & digital collaboration for long-term success

• Ease of use for employees: Submitting an issue is a matter of seconds via a mobile app, which significantly increases employee satisfaction and reduces submission delays.
• Automated categorization and account assignment: ML automatically assigns the correct ledger accounts (GL codes) and cost centers so that the accounting data is correct from the start.
• Instant refund: Seamless integration with payment systems speeds up reimbursement cycles, which improves employee retention and reduces administrative work.
• Audit-proof documentation: Every step, review, and approval is digitally logged and archived, ensuring a complete and simple audit trail that complies with local financial regulations.
• Real time spending control: Finance teams get detailed insights into spending as they occur, allowing proactive budget adjustments and preventing overspending before it occurs.

Through these advances, companies can achieve double-digit automation rates in their spend management processes and significantly speed up their monthly closing times.

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The strategic value of spending automation

Expense management is no longer a necessary administrative burden, but a strategic asset. By automating compliance and data integrity, financial experts are relieved to use the resulting clean data for advanced trend analysis and forecasting. This transition transforms the expense process from a cost center to a source of strategic insights and helps control, optimize, and streamline overall financial processes. Join the successful companies that have achieved unprecedented success by using AI to manage and control all corporate spending — from expenses to invoices to card payments.

Ready for a fully automated financial process?

The tools to put the expense report on autopilot are available. By integrating intelligent, self-learning platforms, companies gain complete transparency and control, ensure compliance, and save millions of time and resources.

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