PUBLIC

Tips and Tricks for

Reporting
For Your SAP Concur Solutions

INTERNAL – SAP and Partners Only

This content is part of the Timely Topics Education Series: Quick

tips and best practices for SAP Concur administrators.
Helpful Hints for Maximizing the Insights
You Can Glean From Your Data
You’ve already deployed SAP Concur solutions to help automate, connect, and
simplify your expense, travel, and accounts payable processes. But what if you could
gain more value from these solutions? Are there ways to glean more insights from your
data, save yourself some time, and maybe even help your day go smoother?

That’s why we created this document. We’ve collected the top tips and tricks
centered around the topic of reporting. Offered by our product experts and
experienced administrators just like you, these techniques help you get the most from
your SAP Concur solutions. We invite you to make your way through the list of tips to
see what might benefit you and your organization.

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Table of Contents

Tips and Tricks for Reporting

1. Activate your report dashboards 9. Explore instances where expenses 15. Create reports with concept mapping*
2. Utilize the Authorized Approver Details exceed the reserved rate for cars or 16. Control access in data warehouse
report hotels 17. Create a “Custom Field” cheat sheet
3. Automate your email alerts 10. Enforce negotiated hotel or car 18. Find the right report and build reports
4. Leverage connected lists information vendor rates quickly
5. Use the Department Manager Persona 11. Identify expenses with a missing 19. Monitor and improve cashflow
20. Schedule a monthly report for last
dashboard receipt declaration
month’s data
6. Distribute reports to stakeholders with 12. Improve airfare negotiations by using
21. Target guidance to employees based
report bursting the Top City Pairs report
on exceptions
7. Make use of the Executive Overview 13. Analyze your payment types 22. Track unusual circumstances with data
Premium dashboard 14. Delve into “Reports approved, intelligence
8. Examine the Expense and Invoice Spend receipts not viewed” 23. Use report bursting for end-users and
Management dashboards travelers

Note: Intelligence product capabilities are required for tips 1 through 14

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Tips and Tricks

1 Activate your report dashboards 3 Automate your email alerts

Easily deliver key YTD T&E metrics and performance indicators Set up email alerts to deliver reports embedded within the
so you can provide the right data to the right organizational email—not sent as attachments—for easy review. This
stakeholders, such as AP, Finance, Operations, Travel, or Tax. makes it easier to make real-time decisions based on pre-
defined data triggers, such as card spend or percentage to
budget.

2 Utilize the Authorized Approver Details report 4 Leverage connected lists information
The Authorized Approver Details report helps you monitor groups A Concur Expense Administrator can create a report in
and approval limits associated with your Authorized Approvers and Intelligence to pull information into connected lists (e.g.,
Cost Object Approvers. Select the appropriate type for options names and ID codes). This can be used to easily manage
associated with this level of the hierarchy. You’ll find this report in these connected lists, and imported into Concur Expense
the Administration folder. to edit or remove items from them.

Note: Intelligence product capabilities are required for tips 1 through 14

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Tips and Tricks
Expense Entry
Intelligence Product Capabilities Are Required for Tips 1 through 14

5 Use the Department Manager Persona dashboard 7 Make use of the Executive Overview Premium
dashboard
This dashboard provides quick access to YTD data relevant to
department managers. See what needs attention and use This dashboard focuses on YTD data of the five key areas
interactive components to drill down into the new detail reports. of interest for finance and expense managers: operations,
Located in the Persona Dashboards tab. spend management, commodity management,
administration, and departmental review. Use this
dashboard to continuously keep your finger on the pulse
of your program.
6 Distribute reports to stakeholders with report bursting
Report Bursting allows a user to easily distribute the contents of a
report to a group of individuals, helping with user communications,
adoption, and compliance. Every recipient receives only the
8 Examine the Expense and Invoice Spend
Management dashboards
information from that report appropriate to their situation. First,
The “Expense Spend Management Overview” dashboard
you build a report to be burst, then schedule it. Consider working
provides key YTD metrics for your organization’s expense
with Consultative Intelligence or purchasing a custom report for
reports and their lifecycle. The “Invoice Spend
complex queries.
Management Overview” dashboard similarly shows metrics
for the invoice process. These dashboards show the
impact on cashflow and help evaluate the need for any
changes in processes. Find them in “Persona Dashboards.”

Note: Intelligence product capabilities are required for tips 1 through 14

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Tips and Tricks

9 Explore instances where expenses exceed the reserved

rate for cars or hotels
11 Identify expenses with a missing receipt declaration
Create a report to identify those expenses using the
View a summary of “booked vs. actual” by employee of car Missing Receipt Declaration function with a filter in your
rental or hotel stays where the expensed amount exceeds the report using the data item “Has Affidavit.” Find this field
rate reserved at the time of booking. Watch for frequent at the following path: Expense > Expense Reports >
offenders and drill down into their reports to identify Entry Information > Additional Entry Details > HAS
opportunities where additional non-compliant expenses were AFFIDAVIT. This field will display a 1 or 0. 1 = Yes, 0 = No.
added to the report. See more here. Apply the filter in the report to say “Has Affidavit = 1”
and it will only pull those expenses with an affidavit.

10 Enforce negotiated hotel or car vendor rates

12 Improve airfare negotiations by using the Top City
Review the “Past Reservations with Rates in Excess of
Pairs report
Negotiated Rate” report to determine potential refunds you can
request from the vendor. Then do the same for upcoming hotel The “Top City Pairs” report provides visibility into
stays or car reservations by reviewing the “Upcoming Hotel booking value, number of trips, and average fares.
Reservations with Rates in Excess of Negotiated Rate” report. Determine if your fares are in line with your
expectations and negotiations with vendors and where
improvements can be made in airfare spend. You may
need to adjust policies or configurations, or negotiate
with vendors.

Note: Intelligence product capabilities are required for tips 1 through 14

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Tips and Tricks

13 Analyze your payment types 15 Create reports with concept mapping*

Analyze payment types to determine what percentage In the data warehouse, look for Concept Field folders
of your program is cash. Often, high cash usage can be (department, cost center, business unit, division, project) to
an indication of other activities you may not be thinking build reports or see spending based on these items. Find
about, like fraud and noncompliance. Keep your cash this in Administration > Expense Admin or Invoice > Map
spend to a minimum. Determine what factors are Concept Fields.
contributing to low card adoption (e.g. geography,
culture, features) and take action. Find Payment Type
Analysis in the Expense Processing folder. Send
automated emails to users who have a high amount or 16 Control access in data warehouse
percentage of cash spend. Limit data access in the SAP Concur solutions data
warehouse among your employees:
o Professional: SAP Concur solutions can set up a
14 Delve into “Reports approved, receipts not viewed” reporting hierarchy (for example, Finance/Accounting
do not need any limits, whereas another team or
Look at the “Reports approved, receipts not viewed” business area may need access to reporting but not
report under the Expense Processing folder in data for the entire organization) or use BI Manager
Intelligence. This may be a good group to submit for Permission (may need to be configured by SAP
random auditing. Concur solutions).
o Standard: Use BI Manager Permission to limit data
(however Cognos roles have no limit on data the user
can see).

Note: Intelligence product capabilities are required for tips 1 through 14

*Functionality only available with Professional edition

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Tips and Tricks

17 Create a “Custom Field” cheat sheet 19 Monitor and improve cashflow

Some reports can be challenging to interpret because your Use these reports to monitor your cashflow if you ever need to
Custom Field labels (often cost centers, divisions or increase and/or ensure control over employee spend:
departments) don’t appear—instead you’ll see their o Expense Accrual by Date Range
generic field label (e.g. custom20). Get old school and o Missing Receipt Audit
keep a “cheat sheet” handy so you know which Custom
o Top Spenders by Employee
Field belongs to which values. You can also pull the
Configuration Report which shows the generic field label o Workflow Cycle Times Details
and what you customized it to.

18 Find the right report and build reports quickly 20 Schedule a monthly report for last month’s data
In the report studio, use a pre-defined filter “Last Month” in
Rely on the Reporting Catalog to get previews and specs the data warehouse (e.g. Sent for Payment date or Paid
on reports before you go through the trouble of guessing date) to build your report. Then you can schedule a report
which one you need. When building a report, always start by day, week, month or more. This can help you (or those
from an existing one—it’s easier than building from scratch. you configure to email) keep on top of a specific business
Pick a very short amount of time as a sample and start with metric. Learn more about using dynamic date filters in this
your own data so you can recognize what each field quick demo video.
represents.

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Tips and Tricks

21 Target guidance to employees based on exceptions 23 Use report bursting for end-users and travelers
Review the “Employee Exceptions – Details” standard Consider using Report Bursting as a communication tool to
report to view how many exceptions are triggered for reach your end-users. Deliver automated reports to
each employee, and what those exceptions are by code employees embarking on travel in areas that might need a
and level. Use this data to create targeted trainings or visa or have special travel restrictions. Another example is
communications to those employees. You could then for users who are entering expenses for the first time or
create a report for a specific timeframe to get a summary after a long hiatus to remind them of policy timelines or
view and see which employees are your highest tips. Reports like these can improve user satisfaction and
“offenders.” drive adoption and compliance.

22 Track unusual circumstances with data intelligence

Track the direct impact of unusual events on your
business by using Concur Expense to gather
intelligence on what to expect when hit with the
unexpected. For example, if you incur direct costs
related to COVID-19, you can track it by:
1. Create a projects code to track expenses impacted
such as travel, hotel, and venue cancellation fees.
2. Have employees add ‘COVID-19” in the Business
Purpose field on the report level or line level as
applicable.
3. Create a unique ‘COVID-19” department that
employees can select.

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Discover Additional Resources

For additional information about maximizing the value of your SAP Concur solutions, we recommend that you check out
SAP Concur Community.

This community is a great resource for administrators like you. It offers a one-stop shop where you can connect with peers,
get answers to questions, and access even more resources that help you get the most from your SAP Concur solutions.

Within SAP Concur Community, please check out these additional resources:

The Reporting Hub section provides easy-to-consume The Timely Topics Education Series includes short-form
knowledge, videos, tools, tips and tricks to help you get more educational content to help administrators like you improve
out of your reporting solution. efficiency and get more time back in your day. On this page,
you’ll find short webinars, demo videos, tips from other
administrators, and how-to guides.
In the Admin User Group, you can ask questions and engage in
conversations with your peers. To be part of this private group,
sign up and create an SAP Concur Community username. On
the left side of the SAP Concur Community sign-in page, you’ll
see directions on how to join the Admin User Group.

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