Virtual Payment Objects for Automated Expense Reconciliation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current systems for managing employee expenses, particularly travel expenses, face inefficiencies due to the manual reconciliation of virtual payment card charges with expense reports, leading to increased time and indirect costs.
Innovation Solution
A distributed computer system that automatically generates virtual payment objects and expense reports, enabling automated reconciliation of preapproved expense charges by linking virtual cards to expense reports through a virtual compute instance that evaluates and approves spend amounts, creating expense payment objects, and generating reconciliation line items.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If virtual payment cards are issued through purchase orders and managed independently of expense reporting applications, then employees can make purchases with preapproved funds, but extensive manual reconciliation time and indirect costs are required to associate payment card charges with expense report line items
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges the virtual card issuance system with the expense reporting application into an integrated system. The virtual card system and expense reporting share a common database and processing architecture, allowing automatic association of card charges with expense reports through programmatic object generation and linking, eliminating the need for manual reconciliation while maintaining preapproved spending controls
Solution Approach 2:
The system enables self-service automated reconciliation through programmatic objects that automatically generate, populate, and reconcile expense report line items against virtual card charges without human intervention. The system performs self-reconciliation by automatically matching transactions through shared database identifiers and programmatic linking, reducing manual labor and processing time
2Measurement precision
If manual reconciliation processes are used to associate virtual card charges with expense reports, then accuracy can be maintained through human review, but extensive time and indirect costs are involved
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces the mechanical manual reconciliation process with an automated computer-based system. Programmatic objects and database operations automatically generate expense report line items, populate them with transaction data, and reconcile charges against preapproved funds. This substitution maintains accuracy through systematic data matching while dramatically improving productivity by eliminating manual labor
Solution Approach 2:
The system implements automated feedback loops where virtual card transactions are automatically captured, processed, and reconciled with expense reports in real-time or near-real-time. The system continuously monitors and matches transactions through programmatic object linking, providing immediate feedback on spending against preapproved limits and automatically adjusting expense report status without manual intervention
Data Source
AI summary
A virtual compute instance that is communicatively coupled to a storage device comprising a database. In an embodiment, a method queries an expense pre-approval application to obtain a set of expense documents from a first computer associated with a first account that is digitally linked to a credit line account and receives the set of expense documents. The expense pre-approval application may be one of a plurality of federated applications hosted using a multi-tenant distributed computing system that comprises the virtual compute instance. The method determines expense data comprising a type of expense document, time of spend, kind of expense, and a plurality of expense charges, for each document in the set of expense documents. Based on the type of document of each expense document in the set of expense documents, the method identifies a payment gateway among a plurality of payment gateways. Each payment gateway executes a plurality of programmatic payment rails that the first account can access. Using the payment gateway, preapproved expense charges are evaluated based on the expense data. The method includes creating and storing in the database, a plurality of expense payment objects associated with the preapproved expense charges when a first account database table associated with the credit line account of the first account matches with a second account database table of the payment gateway, and automatically applying the plurality of expense payment objects to reduce account balances of one or more preapproved spending amounts.