New technology is working to make managing your dispensary in Reno business easier and less risky. For example, new tools like third party risk management software are helping businesses make smarter decisions and take the bias out of risk assessment. Another useful software tool is business spend management software. This tool can help businesses of any size and in any industry get a grasp on their expenses and easily identify ways to cut spending without sacrificing quality and customer service, but it is especially helpful to dispensaries.
What is a business spend management system?
A business spend management system tracks and manages non-payroll business expenses. These include the cost of inventory or raw materials, marketing, rent or mortgage payments and office equipment and supplies. The purpose of this type of software is to have all of your business expenses logged in one place, so dispensary managers and owners can quickly identify trends and locate places for savings.
Spend management systems can be adapted to any size business. They can also be used by third parties who work with your business, such as accountants and business consultants.
Unlike supplier management tools and technology, business spend management systems look at spending from a retailer’s point of view. This is one of the features that make a spend management system so useful for dispensaries.
Benefits of using a business spend management system
In addition to consolidating data for easy reading and access, adopting a business spend management system offers the following benefits:
- Fewer errors. By reducing the number of people who “handle” expense data, you’ll have fewer errors. This includes overpayment errors, which can cost your company money.
- Faster employee reimbursement for expenses. Do you have employees who travel, marketing your product or finding new products for you to carry in your stores? If so, you know the headaches that come with employee expense reports. With a spend management system, employees input their expenses directly into the system, so there is no redundancy as you have when an employee fills out a paper expense report and another employee inputs this data into a management system. This translates to faster employee reimbursement and better morale for the sales department and other employees who incur company expenses.
- Better expense policy enforcement. By having expense reports processed by the software system, you can easily identify areas of non-compliance that may be overlooked under a human review system. The software is able to flag areas of potential non-compliance for the employee’s manager to review.
- Excellent cost analysis tools. Business spend management systems offer a broad range of reporting and analytic tools. For those managers looking for a cost reduction method found in advanced analytics tools, business spend management software delivers. In most cases, managers can see real time expense data.
- Accurate financial data. By having all expense data input directly into the business spend management system, you are able to produce accurate financial data for investors and other interested parties easily and with little hassle.
Types of business spend management systems
There are a number of dependable business spend management solutions. Some of the most popular software products include:
- Spendesk. This all-in-one spend management software product combines spend approvals, physical credit cards, virtual cards, expense reimbursements and invoice management into one software solution. Users report that this product is intuitive and very easy to use. The cost varies depending on the number of users and the size of your company. Spendesk offers a free trial period, so you can see if the software is right for your business.
- Airbase. Designed especially for small to medium-sized businesses, Airbase offers accounts payable automation, a software-enabled corporate card program and fully-automated employee expense reimbursement, all in one system. This product also offers “accounting automation tools for scheduling, accruing, and categorizing transactions to save time and provide a choice of payment types, including virtual cards, physical cards, checks, ACH, and vendor credits from one control center”. There are four Airbase platform packages, including a free version.
- Ramp. Ramp offers a spend management platform as well as unlimited corporate spending cards. The basic Ramp platform is free and features expense management software, expense report controls, real time reporting and excellent accounting integrations. Ramp also offers 1.5% cash back on all spending using the Ramp corporate cards.
If you’re looking for a way to decrease your spending without sacrificing the quality of your products or your commitment to your customers, business spend management software can help you identify areas where you can save money, reduce input errors and the cost associated with these errors, and help improve employee morale by speeding up the reimbursement process for expense reports.
