Admin

SAP Concur is transitioning to a new email infrastructure for outbound email from our services to SAP Concur users. Because of this, companies who filter inbound email based on the sending IP address must add new IP addresses to their Safe Sender list to ensure that their users receive email from SAP Concur.

Initially, the issue described here affected only companies that use Concur Expense. Starting in January, email from other SAP Concur services (such as Travel and Concur Pay) will move to the new email infrastructure.

We will continue to add other services. Please monitor the release notes for more information about the timing of the additional changes.

The Amadeus user permission column has been deprecated from the Travel Addendum Import (Record Type 350) Format for user imports and for employee imports.

This column remains in the flat file and Excel import file, however it is no longer active and any values it contains will be ignored by the system.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This change supports work done by the Concur Travel development teams.

All companies must take all reasonable steps to protect the personal and sensitive information of their employees. As per recommended security-related best practices, remember that custom fields should not contain personal and sensitive data.

NEXT STEPS

If your company is currently using custom fields to store personal or sensitive data (for example, Social Security numbers, family member names or any other personally identifying information), you should plan to remove this information from your existing fields within the service and modify your current configuration.

Refer to the FAQ (English Only) for additional information.

Authentication

These changes are part of the SAP Concur continued commitment to maintaining secure authentication.

Composite login functionality allows users to use a login ID that does not include a domain to log in to SAP Concur products.

All users who use only their username (ex: johndoe) to log in will need to use their CTE Login Name rather than their login ID to log in to SAP Concur products.

With this release, SAP Concur will no longer support composite login sign-in page URLs. The typical URL for a composite login page includes the name of the entity (ex: entity=pxxxxxxxxx) and looks like this: https://www.concursolutions.com/signin.asp?entity=pxxxxxxxxx.

All clients will be using the standard Sign In page to access SAP Concur products. The standard sign in page is https://www.concursolutions.com/nui/signin.

IMPORTANT!

Only the user-facing portion of composite logins is being deprecated at this time. The employee import (scheduled, overnight) and the user import (on-demand, spreadsheet) are not affected. The import will succeed, and the full username will be formed just as it is currently. When composite login information is no longer accepted in the imports, information and instructions will be provided in the release notes.

EFFECTS ON USERS

Users who log in to a composite login page (https://www.concursolutions.com/signin.asp?entity=pxxxxxxxxx) and do not use the at (@) symbol in their user name will need to click the Forgot your user name? link on the Sign In page to retrieve their user name without assistance (preferred) or contact their company administrator to get their CTE Login Name. User passwords remain the same.

Single Sign-On functionality is not impacted by this change. The following users will not be impacted because they do not log in using https://www.concursolutions.com:

• SAP Concur web SSO

• Concur mobile username/password

• Concur mobile SSO

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: Deprecating this feature improves login stability and login success rates, while reducing login dependency.

These changes are part of the SAP Concur continued commitment to maintaining secure authentication.

With this release, SAP Concur will add a new Forgot Password feature to the SAP Concur Sign In page, providing an updated experience for users who log in with user name and password credentials.

Currently, depending on a company's configuration, there may be several other options available for the forgotten password process. With this release, those additional options will be removed. They are:

• Security Questions: Users will no longer receive security question prompts for login authentication.

• On-page text: Company custom text will no longer display.

• Password hints: The Send me an email with my password hint option will no longer be available.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This feature provides greater security for user passwords and streamlines the user experience.

These changes are part of the SAP Concur continued commitment to maintaining secure authentication.

The password field in the 100, 300, 305 and 310 record sets is no longer used to update or bulk reset user passwords. SAP Concur has changed the functionality in imports such that the password field is only used when a user account is created. The field is no longer used to update or bulk reset user passwords. The update and replace password features on the 100 record are no longer used.

This change impacts the employee import and the user import features.

EMPLOYEE IMPORT

For general information about this functionality, refer to the Shared: Employee Import Specification.

USER IMPORT

For general information about this functionality, refer to the Shared: User Import User Guide.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: These changes provide greater security for user passwords.

Expense Pay

The SAP Concur Expense Pay (classic) products execute payments associated with processing expense claims. To ensure compliance with ever-changing regulatory requirements, tailored to geo-diverse markets, SAP Concur has engaged dedicated, experienced, third-party payment processing partners and developed a next generation pay product: Expense Pay – Global.

As previously announced in these release notes (September 2017), moving forward, SAP Concur will use one Expense Pay product to service your business anywhere in the world. The SAP Concur Expense Pay – Global product will replace our existing legacy Expense Pay (classic) offerings (including NA Pay, EMEA Pay and next APA Pay.) For SAP Concur clients with an Expense Pay product, Expense Pay – Global will be our go-forward product. This notification begins our sunset process for all legacy Expense Pay (classic) products.

EXPENSE PAY – NORTH AMERICA SUNSET DATE: 1 SEPTEMBER 2019

Over 4000 customers have already migrated to Expense Pay – Global. Customers paying in USD and CAD must switch their subscription from the depreciating service, “Expense Pay – North America”, to “Expense Pay – Global” prior to the 1 September retirement date. Expense Pay – Global supports USD, CAD, GBP and Euro today. Customers using other currencies on classic Expense Pay are not required to migrate those currencies this year but are welcome to start the migration process. Contact paymigration@concur.com to discuss and schedule your migration.

EXPENSE PAY – NORTH AMERICA AND EXPENSE PAY – EMEA LIMITATIONS

SAP Concur does not support clients adding the following currencies with the classic product: United States Dollars, Canadian Dollars, Mexican Pesos, Euro, Swiss Franc, Danish Krone, Swedish Krona or UK Pounds. If a client has already implemented and is using these currencies with the classic product, they can continue using these until they are migrated to the new platform or until the defined sunset date.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: The Expense Pay – Global offering maintains industry best practices for payment processing functionality within SAP Concur.

Japan Public Transportation (JPT)

The Japan Public Transportation (JPT) database of stations and lines received routine maintenance changes such as additions, name changes and removals.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: Lists in Concur Expense continue to reflect JPT's current stations and lines.

Next Generation (NextGen) Expense

Update: In order to respond to and take advantage of feedback from customers, and to align with SAP Concur’s commitment to ensure a smooth and successful transition, we are working on a revised deployment strategy for Next Generation Expense.

SAP Concur is dedicated to the consistent improvement of our products, not only the features they provide, but also the experience of using those features. How users interact with technology changes over time, along with needs and expectations. We are constantly listening to our customers and soliciting feedback on how we can improve the user experience.

NextGen Expense is the continued evolution of the SAP Concur user experience. It was built from extensive user research and data analytics that include 680 1:1 conversations, 58 usability studies, 3,000+ survey responses and 1.3B monthly user actions.

Customers will have the ability to preview and then opt in to NextGen Expense before the mandatory cutover.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: The result is the next generation of the Expense user interface designed to provide a modern, consistent and streamlined user experience. This technology not only provides an enhanced UI, but also allows SAP Concur to react more quickly to customer requests to meet changing needs as they happen.

Claim Header

The Claim Start Date and Claim End Date fields may be included in an expense claim header form to capture a date range for the expense claim. If either (or both) of these fields are included in the header, users who click Copy Claim will see that the dates in those fields will now also be incremented based on the new starting date provided. The incremented dates are default values and can be edited by the user.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This feature is a convenience for users who create expense claims with periodically recurring expenses.

Admin

Customers will need to access SAP Concur products and services via the following domains:

• *.concursolutions.com

• *.concurcdc.cn

This change is targeted for 8 June 2019.

SAP Concur recommends clients migrate to one of the domains at their earliest convenience, if they are not already using one of them.

Please contact appsec@sap.com for any questions regarding this change.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This change will allow customers to access SAP Concur services in a consistent, secure manner.

Authentication

These changes are part of the SAP Concur continued commitment to maintaining secure authentication.

SAP Concur is planning to add a new Sign In page, providing an updated login experience for users who log in with a user name and password credentials. Current Single Sign-On (SSO) users will be able to start the SSO login process at www.concursolutions.com. This feature is planned for 2019.

The new Sign In page feature includes the following:

• Two-step login: provides enhanced security, meets current industry standards and provides a better login success rate

• Multi-account login: allows administrators to log in with multiple accounts (planned for a future release)

• User avatar: enhances the user experience (planned for a future release)

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This feature provides better security and a faster, convenient experience for users logging in to SAP Concur products and services.

These changes are part of the SAP Concur continued commitment to maintaining secure authentication.

Single Sign-On allows users to access multiple applications using one set of login credentials. Currently, SAP Concur has two methods for signing in: with a user name and password or using SSO with identity provider (IdP) credentials, such as a user's login credentials for their organisation.

SAP Concur is planning to add a Manage Single Sign-On (SSO) feature to SAP Concur products that provides clients with a self-service option for setting up SSO for their organisation. SSO is currently supported for Concur Expense, Invoice, Request and Travel.

The new Manage Single Sign-On (SSO) feature is a replacement tool for clients using existing SSO configuration on the Security Keys page and a new tool for clients that now want to implement SSO at their organisation. Existing SSO configuration on the Security Keys page and the new SSO Self-Service tool will both be available until everyone has migrated to the new SSO Self-Service tool.

Other SAP Concur products and services are outside the scope of this initial release.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This feature provides SAP Concur clients with a self-service option for setting up SSO.

Budget Insight

Budget Insight is a budget management tool that is being retired on 31 December 2019. It is recommended that clients who want to use budget functionality purchase the new Budget product that SAP Concur released last year. The new Budget feature offers greater functionality, an improved UI and additional integrations with SAP Concur products. Most notably is the inclusion of additional expense data from Concur Expense, Concur Invoice, Concur Travel and Concur Request (previously only data from Concur Expense and Concur Request were available).

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: The retirement of Budget Insight will provide clients with the opportunity to purchase the new Budget product, which gives greater value to clients by making budgets visible, actionable and near real-time.

Company Cards

SAP Concur will soon offer an American Express (Amex) business card connection. The Amex Business Card direct connect feature will allow customers to connect Amex business credit cards while in Concur Expense.

The Amex Business Card feature provides the following functionality:

• Provides an automatic daily refresh of transactions from Amex to SAP Concur (Concur Expense users do not need to sign into Amex to refresh transactions)
• Offers compatibility with SAP Concur Expense Assistant
• Allows the primary card holder to manage transactions without having to view all supplemental card transactions
• Supports Delegate and Proxy capabilities on transactions
• Provides transaction currency handling for foreign transactions
• Includes viewing available transactions
• Includes Concur Analytics for Standard reporting (including unsubmitted transactions)

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This feature provides SAP Concur customers with a business card connector.

E-Receipts

As part of our ongoing commitment to e-receipts and the effortless expense claim, air e-receipts generated by SAP Concur based on ticket and coupon data from GDS and some TripLink transactions are getting a new look.

User / Customer Benefit: This change brings air e-receipts up to SAP Concur’s standard e-receipt format, providing users with a more consistent experience in Concur Expense. The format is also more convenient for users working in NextGen Expense. This change also eliminates a performance/stability issue for end users who would sometimes not see new air e-receipts as quickly as they should.

E-receipt technology is evolving quickly. Today, the receipt handling rules are hardcoded to accept e-receipts to meet image requirements. Moving forward, as e-receipts become more common, and legislation about them becomes more complex, this is not a valid assumption for all countries and circumstances.

Clients who want to maintain their current system behaviour, that is to continue to accept e-receipts to meet image requirements, will need to configure a custom receipt rule.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This change will allow clients who use e-receipts to continue to comply with regulatory and contractual requirements for documentation to substantiate an expense.

Quick Expense

SAP Concur will be deprecating the Quick Expense v3 API in a future release. This API will be replaced by Quick Expense v4. Developers using Quick Expense v3 should transition to Quick Expense v4 when it is available.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: The Quick Expense v3 API only supports the previous authentication method, and it provides access to some fields that are not necessary to expose. These issues are resolved with the new Quick Expense v4 API.

SAP Concur will be releasing Quick Expense v4 for partner and client use. Quick Expense v4 includes the following improvements over Quick Expense v3:

• Secure authentication: This API supports the current SAP Concur authentication method.

• Multi-part messages: A developer can post both the data & receipt image in a single call rather than separate calls required by v3.

• Supports digitisation status: Quick expense v4 POST API supports the eBunsho timestamp requirement, if the client is using this functionality and has completed the required configuration in Concur Expense.

• Global availability: Quick expense v4 POST API is supported in all SAP Concur data centres.

Quick Expense v4 removes some of the functionality available in v3:

• ReceiptImageID attribute will no longer be exposed: This attribute may contain personally identifiable information and therefore has been removed to increase data security.

• GET, PUT and DELETE endpoints will no longer be exposed: These endpoints are not provided in v4 as there is no known business need.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This new version of the Quick Expense API supports the latest SAP Concur API authentication method and provides several enhancements to the POST functionality.

Receipts

SAP Concur will soon allow the conversion of paper receipts into digital copies with legal value. Receipt Digitalisation will provide SAP Concur customers with the ability to conform a paper receipt into a legal digital copy according to their country's regulatory or government authorities.

Once it is available for general release, this feature will be available to new customers and existing customers in France and those who have configurations in France. Additional countries will be included in future releases.

The initial release for France will include:

• Enabling the conversion of paper receipts into digital copies with legal value

• Viewing the “Certified” status of the receipt in NextGen Expense (planned enhancement)

• Ability to configure an audit rule that looks for expenses with certified receipts

The Receipt Digitalisation feature requires that users must be using the NextGen Expense UI. It is recommended that customers migrate to the NextGen Expense UI before activating this service.

To capture legal receipt images, clients must also be using the SAP Concur mobile app and can use ExpenseIt with the mobile app, though ExpenseIt is not required. The user will take a picture of the paper receipt with the mobile app. Once the picture is taken, the digitisation process will be applied to the image. Once the process is complete, a stamp will display on the receipt image in the mobile app confirming whether the receipt is certified or not.

Receipt images will display for users in NextGen Expense in Available Expenses, Available Receipts and in the expense list.

Approvers and processors will view the digital receipt status in the expense claim and expense list in the existing version of Concur Expense. An audit rule can be created that identifies certified receipts on the expense line item. A new icon will display for receipts that are certified.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This feature provides a paperless receipt option that adheres to local requirements and regulations for paper into digital tax receipt processing and compliance.