Spend Insights Report Highlights Changes in Employee Spend Behaviors During Global Pandemic
Oversight, the global leader in spend management technology, released its May 2020 Spend Insights Report. The second in a series of reports, the findings reveal an uptick in airline spend as well as heightened risk introduced by working and conducting business remotely.
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“This expedites the identification and resolution of spend risk and helps improve compliance through better policy administration.”
Based on Oversight’s data analysis, airfare spend increased 147% the week of April 6 and continued to climb after hitting a low point the week of March 30. Airline travel is a precursor to travel and expense spending and could translate into an uptick in other spend categories such as auto rentals and lodging.
Additionally, key spend risks identified in the report relate to virtual customer engagement, a second wave of remote work expenses and third-party payment activity – all resulting in continued spend in two high-risk spend categories, mail/phone orders and miscellaneous stores, which includes merchants such as Amazon, Best Buy and Apple.
The report serves as a follow-up to Oversight’s April Spend Insights Report, which revealed how the pandemic swiftly impacted T&E expenditures starting in early March.
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“As we continue to monitor for purchasing behavior changes, we’ve noticed a new best practice emerge – different teams within the finance function are collaborating to help steer their organization through this current crisis,” said Terrence McCrossan, CEO of Oversight. “This expedites the identification and resolution of spend risk and helps improve compliance through better policy administration.”
New High-Risk Methods of Customer Engagement
Sales and other client-facing teams are increasing spend on meal delivery services, such as DoorDash, as well as gift cards for wine.com, Grubhub, etc. as a means of engaging while face-to-face meetings remain unfeasible. The average gift card amount is $200, and Starbucks and Uber Eats are the most popular.
