Growth and Optimization
How to Make Concur Invoice Work Harder for You
If you're already using SAP Concur, you know the basics. But are you getting everything out of it? One AP specialist at Barron Lighting Group shares how leaning fully into Concur Invoice transformed her team's day-to-day, and what that means for customers like you.
The Hidden Cost of Not Fully Using Concur Invoice
For many SAP Concur customers, the platform's biggest value isn't in the setup. It's in the full adoption. When Barron Lighting Group, a 114-person U.S. lighting manufacturer based in Glendale, Arizona, first brought on SAP Concur back in 2017, they were still wrestling with a challenge you might recognize: scattered paper invoices, duplicate data entry, and an AP process that required more hands than it should.
Sound familiar? The good news is you already have what you need to fix it.
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50% Less time on invoicing and expense reports |
2 to 1
AP headcount maintained as volume grew |
Zero Duplicate ERP entries with direct import |
How Concur Invoice & Concur Expense Eliminate Manual AP Work
Tara Reid, Accounts Payable Specialist at Barron Lighting Group, had used Concur Expense at a previous employer. When she was job searching, she valued the product so much that she actively looked for companies using SAP Concur solutions. When she joined Barron and found they had also implemented both Concur Expense and Concur Invoice, she was immediately in her element.
The key unlock for Barron? Integrating both Concur products directly with their existing ERP system. Financial data flows automatically across platforms, eliminating the manual re-entry that was quietly eating up hours every week.
“There's no double work. We import everything directly into the ERP.”
- Tara Reid, Accounts Payable Specialist, Barron Lighting Group
How AP Automation Helps Finance Teams Scale Efficiently
Here's the stat that speaks loudest to business owners and finance leaders: as Barron Lighting Group grew, with more invoices, more purchase orders, and more employee expenses, their AP function didn't need to grow to keep up. The automation built into Concur Invoice handled the increased volume, and Tara's team stayed lean.
In her words: “It's more invoicing and more people, but not more time completing tasks.” That's the compound return on automation. You've already invested in the platform. Let it work at scale.
Tip for Existing Customers
If you're using Concur Expense but haven't fully connected Concur Invoice to your ERP, that integration is where much of the time savings live. Reach out to your account team to review your current configuration. It's often a simpler connection than you'd expect.
How SAP Concur Improves Spend Visibility and Approval Workflows
One of the less-discussed benefits Tara highlighted is what centralization does for approval transparency. When all invoices and expenses live in one place, managers can spot discrepancies in real time, not at month-end. Credit card charges on weekends, expenses that don't align with policy, invoices that need a second look: all of it surfaces faster when approvers aren't hunting through email threads and paper files.
For Barron, this visibility contributed directly to staffing efficiency. The accounts payable function went from two people to one, not through cuts, but because the system absorbed the complexity.
“Approvers can see everything right in front of them and catch anything that doesn't look right.”
- Tara Reid, Accounts Payable Specialist, Barron Lighting Group
Why Mobile Receipt Capture Improves Expense Management
If you have employees on the road or working remotely, the SAP Concur mobile app is one of those features worth re-emphasizing internally. Tara points to receipt capture as a game-changer for Barron's field staff: employees photograph receipts in the moment and move on. No scanner, no envelope of crumpled paper, no chasing down documentation weeks later.
It sounds simple, but the downstream effect is real: cleaner expense reports, faster reimbursements, and fewer back-and-forth corrections for your AP team.
| AP Process Area | Before (Manual/Partial Use) | After (Optimized Concur Invoice) |
|---|---|---|
| Invoice entry | Manual data entry from paper/PDF/email | Automated invoice capture and processing |
| ERP updates | Duplicate entry across systems | Direct ERP integration |
| Approvals | Email-based or delayed approvals | Centralized digital approval workflow |
| Visibility | Limited, fragmented tracking | Real-time invoice visibility |
| Error rates | High risk of duplicates and mistakes | Reduced errors through automation |
| AP workload | Scaling requires more headcount | Handles volume without additional staff |
How Existing SAP Concur Customers Can Get More Value
Barron Lighting Group's story isn't about a dramatic transformation. It's about steady, compounding efficiency built on a platform you're already paying for. The question isn't whether SAP Concur can help your business. You know it can. The question is whether you're extracting full value from every feature you have access to today.
Whether it's tightening your ERP integration, enabling the mobile app for your road warriors, or auditing your approval workflows for bottlenecks, there's likely room to do more with what you already have.
Already a customer? Let's connect!
Connect with your SAP Concur account team to review your current setup and identify where you might be leaving efficiency on the table.
