Admin

SAP Concur is in the process of updating the format of all email notifications. These changes will provide a fresher, consistent look and feel across all SAP Concur services.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: The intent is to provide a consistent, updated look for users.

Approval Emails

For companies that use this feature, its retirement means that the content of the emails that are currently received by their users who approve expense claims will change.

BEFORE 11 DECEMBER 2018

When enabled, this feature allows an approver to approve (or reject) an expense claim by replying to the email.

AFTER 11 DECEMBER 2018

After this feature is retired, the approver can approve the claim using either the SAP Concur mobile app or www.concursolutions.com.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This change will close a security gap and allow SAP Concur to devote more resources to features that are used by many or most of our clients.

Currency Admin

Following the Central Bank of Venezuela's redenomination of its currency to Bolívar Soberano (VES), the Bolívar Fuerte (VEF) has been withdrawn as legal tender. Accordingly, SAP Concur has retired the Bolívar Fuerte (VEF) currency from Concur Expense.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This change supports SAP Concur customers who use the Bolívar currency.

Email Infrastructure Change **Ongoing**

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

Concur Expense Only: Be aware that – at this time – the issue described here affects only companies that use Concur Expense and filter incoming email based on IP addresses. (This includes all editions of Expense – whether the company uses Expense by itself or integrated with any other SAP Concur product or service.) Other SAP Concur services (such as Travel and Concur Pay) are not currently affected.

We are currently targeting the first quarter of 2019 to make additional changes. Be aware that all affected companies will be notified well ahead of time and will be provided all possible options for managing this issue.

Expense Assistant

Expense Assistant can automatically create trip-based expense claims and add trip-based expenses to these expense claims. Currently, Expense Assistant automatically creates monthly expense claims as a user's expenses flow into Concur Expense. This is known as creating a calendar-based expense claim.

With this enhancement, Expense Assistant can create either of two types of expense claims: calendar-based and trip-based. When Expense Assistant creates a trip-based expense claim, Expense Assistant will automatically create an expense claim based on a specific trip booked in Concur Travel and will populate the expense claim with the client's expenses that occur between the trip's start and end dates.

Users using Expense Assistant will only be able to have Expense Assistant automatically create calendar-based or trip-based expense claims, not both types of expense claims.

The type of expense claim created by Expense Assistant is defined at the group level.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This feature automates more of the expense reporting process, to provide an easier end user experience.

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.

Products and Users Affected: In order to take advantage of these improvements, Expense customers will be required to transition to NextGen Expense. The following provides information about the timeline and resources available to ensure this process is smooth and efficient for all users.

These UI changes apply to:

• All editions of Concur Expense (Professional/Premium and Standard)

• End users; there are no changes for approvers, processors or admins

IMPORTANT! Timeline and Milestones

There are three important milestones for customers as they transition from the existing UI to NextGen Expense.

• We are currently in the Preview Period: During this time, the new UI is available to customers worldwide. We encourage administrators/power users to use the Preview Period to become familiar with the new interface and process flows. This is also an excellent time to begin updating internal training materials and preparing the organisation for the mandatory transition.

• General Availability (Opt In Period): Following the Preview Period is General Availability. During this period, NextGen Expense will be complete; all features from the existing UI will be available.

  Customers should use this period to execute their organisation's transition plan to the NextGen Expense UI.

• Mandatory Cutover to NextGen Expense: All customers will be required to move to NextGen Expense. This ensures that SAP Concur continues to offer a consistent user experience for all customers and allows for superior product support.

  Customers are encouraged to complete the tasks necessary to ensure a smooth transition for their organisation during the Preview Period and then transition during General Availability.

Payment Manager

For clients who have Expense Pay or Expense Pay - Global, the Accounting Extract Reconciliation tool is relocating from Tools > Concur Classic Admin to Tools > Payment Manager > Monitor Batches.

The previous (Concur Classic Admin) access path was Administration > Company > Tools > Concur Classic Admin > Reimbursement Manager > Extract Reconciliation.

The new (Payment Manager) access path is Administration > Company > Tools > Payment Manager > Monitor Batches > Accounting Extract Reconciliation.

The original Reimbursement Manager pages (Administration > Company > Tools > Concur Classic Admin > Reimbursement Manager) will be retired by the end of Q1 2019.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This change puts the tool in a more convenient location for reimbursement managers and discontinues the need to use the original Reimbursement Manager pages.

Travel Allowance

SAP Concur has created two new system calculation properties to support extended domestic trips. The names of the new system calculation properties are:

• (Government rate) extended_trip_domestic_govt_amount

• (Company rate) extended_trip_domestic_comp_amount

These new calculation properties are used for domestic trips longer than 28 days. Beginning on the 29th day of travel, the new calculation properties are used. The default amount for each new property is 195 Norwegian Kroner (NOK).

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This change helps SAP Concur clients maintain legal compliance.

Admin

As SAP Concur continues to grow, steps must be taken to enhance and improve the performance of our system so that we can meet customer expectations and the needs of their business.

Our overall goal is to significantly improve the performance of SAP Concur services by reducing the amount of data that is stored in our Production datastore. By reducing the data in the Production system, we can use server memory much more efficiently, which reduces processing time for transactions. For this reason, SAP Concur is developing an archive process for users who have been deactivated by their employers for at least three years. The archive process moves this "deactivated" user data from our Production datastore to a separate Reporting datastore.

User/Customer Benefit: Moving deactivated user data will provide faster processing time for transactions. In addition, it provides a more secure environment for inactive users' personal information.

IMPORTANT!

We are currently piloting the process and evaluating the results. Our goal is to ensure that customers are not negatively affected, that we have considered all pertinent scenarios and that the archiving process provides the desired results.

There is no target date for the implementation of this new process. We will announce via release notes well ahead of time.

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 log in without having to enter additional credentials. 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

• Password hint removal: provides better security for users and SAP Concur

• 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.

Budget

In a future release, workflows will be available for Budget. Workflows define how the system routes invoices, expense claims and requests through approval and processing steps. SAP Concur's flexible workflow feature for Budget allows companies to design workflows specifically tailored to their unique needs.

Without budget review, budgets may become fully consumed well before the end of a period or year leaving an organisation with limited options and budget owners with, for example, exceeded budgets. In addition, early spending means that more important (to the organisation) spending will be declined because lesser important spending consumed the budget early on.

Combining budget review in the workflow adds value. Audit rules and workflow step rules can help organisations to add in controls when it makes sense to fine tune to an organisation's specific needs.

Equally important is the determination when a spending item is regarded as committed toward a budget. In most organisations, the commit is when a spending item is paid; it went through most if not all approval steps. In other organisations, the commit occurs much earlier. As soon as a purchase request or an authorisation request is approved, it is regarded as "promised".

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This feature will provide clients with control over the budget spend to, for example, avoid exceeded budgets too early in a budget period or budget year.

Budget Insight

Budget Insight is a budget management tool that is being retired on 30 June 2019. Clients who want to use budget functionality are recommended to purchase the new Budget product from SAP Concur, which was released earlier this year. The new Budget product 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 Budget product that gives greater value to clients by making budgets visible, actionable and near real-time.

Company Administration

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 SAP Concur clients with a self-service option for setting up SSO for their organisation. SSO is currently supported for Concur Expense, Invoice, Request and Travel.

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

The new Manage Single Sign-On (SSO) feature will be accessible from the Administration > Company > Company Admin page.

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

Expense Pay – Global

Public sector clients will be able to use Western Union Business Solutions (WUBS) to process their United States Dollar (USD) payments.

The Expense Pay – Global product functions the same way regardless of which payment-processing partner your funding account is configured to use. What is different about WUBS compared to Bambora (or classic Expense Pay) is how your funding accounts are set up in Concur Expense. Each payment-processing partner has unique forms that must be completed, submitted and approved as part of the onboarding process.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This additional payment-processing partner increases the value of our Expense Pay – Global offering.

Test User Admin

SAP Concur is retiring the functionality in the Test User Admin feature that removes the transactions of test users from Concur Expense, Concur Invoice, Concur Travel and Concur Request.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: This change will allow SAP Concur to devote more resources to development and maintenance of features that are used by many or most of our clients.

Training Administration

To simplify the Training Administration page, the page will no longer have tabs, only the current contents of the Alternate URL tab will remain.

In addition to this change, access to the Training Administration page will move from Company Admin to Tools.

Business Purpose / Client Benefit: These changes make the page easier to find and use.

Client Notifications

The list of non-affiliated subprocessors is available here: SAP Concur list of Subprocessors (English Only)

Monthly browser certifications, both current and planned, are available with the other SAP Concur monthly release notes, accessible from What's New - Professional Edition