No matter how you view expenses, the reality is that they are an integral part of every business and company. You may incur expenditures on a weekly, monthly, or yearly basis for the well-being of your business, such as subscriptions, maintenance, salaries, and more.

As much as you want to acquire profits, you will also spend. The one mistake we make often is that in the bid to acquire more sales and profits, we tend to pay less attention to the movement of our expenses.

Overlooking your business expenses can be dangerous, and without effective expense management, you will lose track of where your money is going, thereby posing a risk to the progress of your business.

You need to put extra effort into expense management to avoid such risks. As a business owner, remembering your business expenses off-heart can be challenging. In such cases, leveraging financial management software like Bujeti can be invaluable for effective expense management.

We will explore and explain the essential features of effective expense management. Understanding these features will empower you to leverage them for effective expense management in your business.

What is effective expense management, and why is it important?

Before we dive into the essential features of effective expense management, let’s quickly shed some light on the meaning of expense management and its importance.

Expense management is the process and measures businesses implement to empower and guide them to monitor, manage and control their spending. This process involves the art of recording, tracking, cross-checking, processing and approving expenses.

Expense management contributes to the success of every business, as it helps business owners and finance managers ensure they are operating within their budgetary constraints and providing detailed insights into their spending and financial health.

Obtaining insights from your expenses will also help to make the right and informed business decisions for future endeavors. Expense management also fosters accountability and empowers business owners and finance teams to account for where money is going, and know what they spend it on.

What are the essential features of effective expense management?

Expense management can be a daunting and challenging task due to difficulties like human errors, inefficient expense reporting and potential fraud.

To overcome these difficulties, you should consider leveraging software / tools that make expense management effective and seamless. One of the tools you can rely on for everything effective expense management is Bujeti.

Bujeti is a simple financial management software that allows you to control and manage your expenses. You can achieve this by recording, tracking and budgeting your business expenses. These features and more make Bujeti your best bet for expense management.

Now, you have a clue about what Bujeti is. Let’s see what makes Bujeti the most trusted and effective expense management solution for African businesses.

Budgets

One of the reasons businesses overspend is the absence of budgets. And so, many “wing it”, spending without limit and caution, which is risky for the growth of your business. There should be a guide that governs how you spend in your business / company. The budgets feature on Bujeti enables you to create a realistic and flexible budget that can accommodate essential expenses for a particular period in your business.

With this feature, you can set budgets for various things such as projects, tools, vendors, maintenance, travel or anything. Budgeting your expenses can help you know where your money is going and evaluate if the things you are spending it on are worth it in terms of contributing to business growth.

Also, from the budgets feature on Bujeti, you can gain visibility into your transactions and keep a tab on them, making tracking your expenses smooth and achievable.

Spending limits

Businesses tend to overspend most times as there are no limits to the amount that can be accessed and spent at a given period. This is never an issue for businesses that use the spending limits feature on Bujeti.

The cool thing about this feature is that it enables businesses to create a customisable policy and enforces some restrictions, especially with expenses outside the budget.

This feature gives you the authority to review and approve all expenses within the budget. You can equally reject any expenses that won’t make a difference to the progress of the business.

Corporate cards

The use of corporate cards is another effective way to have control over your expenses. With the cards, you can seamlessly streamline your expense management process. Bujeti offers multi-currency corporate cards that cater to various expense types.

For instance, if your Bujeti corporate card is tied to a budget for travel expenses, you may not be able to use the same card for maintenance expenses. By doing so, this enforces some restrictions.

Also, many founders and business owners are guilty of mixing personal and business money in one card. Bujeti helps you separate your personal and business funds with corporate cards, eliminating complications and confusion during accounting and fostering financial clarity.

Expense policies

Creating policies for the distribution and movement of expenses in and out of your business is one vital thing you should consider doing to enforce expense management. With customisable expense policies on Bujeti, you can vet and approve expenses.

You can also share your expense policies with employees to guide them on the necessary expenses they can bring for approval that align with the business goals and are within the budget.

Approval workflows

Implementing approval workflows prevents automatic approval of expenses without oversight. With the approval workflows, you can monitor the rate at which you accept or reject expenses within your business to avoid exceeding your spending limits. This can also help you to know what expenses are a priority at the time.

Vendor management

Most businesses / companies work with vendors. Managing and gathering multiple vendors for different purposes can be challenging and time-consuming because you will deal with their different information and preferred payment methods. All of these can hinder financial transparency.

Bujeti offers a vendor management platform that empowers you to manage your vendors from a centralized database. This feature also enables them to choose their preferred method of payment. With the vendor management feature, you can confidently manage, track and keep a tab on your vendors while ensuring efficiency and transparency in your business / company.

Multi-currency support

Running an African business / company where you make global payments and expenses can be challenging due to some restrictions.

Bujeti does a great job at catering for the global needs of your business transactions and supporting you with multi-currency capabilities, especially assisting you in sorting out global payments and expenses without any hassle.

With this feature on Bujeti, you can confidently say goodbye to issues such as currency conversion.

Expense categorization

Nothing affects your expense management like when you mix up your expenses, and this causes confusion during accounting.

Your expense management process could be more seamless if you classify them based on groups and categories. With expense categorization, you can differentiate between your operational and non-operational expenses, enhancing smooth tracking and accounting. The good part is that you can do this on Bujeti.

Reporting and analytics

It is vital to create and generate reports to view your business performance, and your expense report should not be left out.

By creating an expense report, you can view the analytical state of your expenses to assist you in making better-informed decisions that can contribute to your business growth.

For example, real-time analytics can help you identify spending patterns that do not contribute meaningfully and cut them off.

Real-time monitoring

As a founder / business owner, you might lose track of, and be unable to control your business expenses, especially during your absence. Bujeti offers constant access to your expense information and continuous control of your expenditures, regardless of your physical location.

You get actionable insights on your spending habits, and are able to identify areas where you can cut costs and optimize your budget for maximum efficiency.

Integration with accounting software

Running your expense management from one platform that gives you access to all your other vital accounting tools is one of the best decisions you can make for your business.

It is unwise to allow your expenses to be all over the place. You can integrate your favorite accounting software (e.g. QuickBooks, Xero, Sage and others) that gathers your financial data in one place on Bujeti.

Get started with an expense management solution

As a founder / business owner, you will continually make expenses that matter in your business / company but endeavor to create measures and processes that assist you in managing and controlling your expenses effectively.

The essential features for effective expense management on Bujeti, such as budgets, spending limits, corporate cards and others, can help you achieve your business goals.

With Bujeti as your financial management tool, you have nothing to worry about your business expenses, and the best part is that you get to control your expenses and not the other way round.

The earlier you start managing and controlling your expenses, the better it is for the growth of your business. Start today!