Data from leading expense management software provider Rydoo has revealed that on average companies are overpaying on employee expenses by between 5 and 14%. 

The data compiled from more than 10 million employee expenses through Rydoo’s Smart Audit module that automatically processes expenses and detects non-compliance, revealed that 86% of employee expenses submitted are compliant and within policy. Without the right technology in place to catch the remaining 14%, companies risk overpaying on expenses, inflating operating costs, creating audit risks, and hurting potential VAT recovery. 

The report also reveals that companies are wasting thousands of hours reviewing expenses. For example, a mid-sized company of 650 employees will spend around 2,300 hours per year manually checking employee expenses, often missing patterns and repeats. Manual reviewing can increase the likelihood of non-compliant expenses slipping through the cracks, leading to overpaying.  

By using solutions with embedded AI, companies can process expense submissions automatically, in real time with 97% accuracy, leaving time to focus on those flagged as potentially non-compliant. 

Sebastien Marchon, CEO of Rydoo, commented: “Advanced AI audit solutions can close control gaps by enabling finance teams to automatically review every claim in real-time and apply policy consistently, while maintaining human oversight where it adds value. With meaningful time and cost saving benefits, companies that fail to embrace technology in expense management will fall behind.

And, with 30% of expense fraud set to be AI-generated in the coming years, fake or fabricated expenses are going to become common place amongst certain employees looking to exploit their finance departments. Companies will need to work even harder to ensure they’ve got the right technology in place to catch non-compliant expenses that could impact their bottom line.”

Sebastiaan Vanhecke, Chief Product Officer of Rydoo, commented: “We’re moving on from AI that follows rules to AI that helps redesign them. The next generation of expense audit systems won’t just flag exceptions but learn from patterns, suggest smarter controls, and guide users in real time. That’s how finance evolves from oversight to intelligent governance.”