Our Best Features for Simplifying Billing

If you ask us, the true unsung heroes of the business travel world are the finance and accounting professionals. Processing paperwork, managing reimbursements and reconciliation, and paying invoices gets complicated fast, particularly when overseeing the expenses of large teams traveling for multiple projects at once.

We knew there had to be a better way — so we built smart, time-saving features into the Hotel Engine platform to limit hours of tedious labor often associated with billing for workforce travel. Check out the five top ways we simplify billing!

(This post is part of our simplicity series, highlighting our top features for simplifying your business travel. Check out our earlier post on simplifying your hotel booking process here.)

All your charges on a single invoice

No matter how many hotel rooms you’re booking or for how many projects or teams, you can pay them off in one fell swoop with Direct Bill. Qualified members receive a line of credit from Hotel Engine that can be used for all hotel charges — even incidentals! When you use Direct Bill for your payments, you don’t have to worry about credit card authorizations or reconciling charges from a card statement.

Using Direct Bill also frees up company lines of credit, so there are no concerns about credit cards being maxed out. Adding incidental coverage to your Direct Bill account also removes the burden from your travelers of needing to place holds on personal credit cards for incidentals at check-in.

Flexible payment methods

With Hotel Engine, you can pay your way. In addition to all major credit cards, we also accept payment via ACH bank transfer, and even Google Pay and Apple Pay. If you’re enrolled in Direct Bill, set up AutoPay, and payments can be hands-free. Simply select your preferred payment method and your payments will process automatically at regular intervals — no hassle, no worry, no time wasted.

Analyze spend with detailed reports

Keep track of your hotel spend in real time from one organized, accessible dashboard. Get access to your folios in a few clicks and monitor how much is being spent, in what locations and by which travelers. Plus, download reports as CSV files to take a deeper dive into your data whenever you need additional visibility or reporting.

Your Trends page also features useful information that can inform better budgeting decisions in the future — like how much you’ve saved from booking with Hotel Engine and how much you’ve earned in Rewards.

Simplified reconciliation with custom fields

Set yourself up for easier, faster reconciliation by adding custom fields to your account. Create fields that reflect the information your team uses to stay organized, such as:

• Job name
• Job code
• Tax ID
• PO number
• Cost center
• Employee ID
• Store number
• Division
• Reason for travel

Set up your custom fields as text boxes or drop-downs, optional or required — whatever best suits your business needs. By ensuring that your receipts always come coded with the information you need, you can save your team significant time and get your books closed much faster, with fewer errors due to manual effort.

Accurate charges ensured

Our team is dedicated to ensuring that your travel program runs smoothly at every step — from booking to managing payments. We examine all charges and validate them with the hotel to ensure accuracy, catching errors before they reach your desk and saving you headaches when it comes to reconciliation.

Enjoy simplified billing now

Ready to see what a difference these features can make for your business? Create your free account today! Hotel Engine simplifies every element of your company’s lodging program, from searching and booking to billing and managing trips.

‍