AI is transforming the landscape of expense auditing

AppZen has its fingers on the pulse of the AI revolution in finance, moving beyond basic receipt scanning toward a more nuanced understanding of spend behavior. What's the driving force behind this shift? Is it the awareness that current auditing tools still have huge loopholes? Or perhaps it's the myriad of fascinating, even audacious expense claims that keep cropping up? Whatever the catalyst, it's evident that neither traditional ERP nor OCR systems can manage a full automation of expenses.

These rules-based auditing tools are like a watchman armed with only a small flashlight, peering into the darkness. They illuminate a certain area but can't differentiate between a prowler and a housecat. The limitations of OCR technology (optical character recognition) are a key factor. OCR can read text but lacks the ability to 'understand' it. It's like a librarian who can tell you which books are on the shelf but has no clue what's inside them. If OCR sees "$100 at a gas pump," it merely notes it down. But is that $100 for fuel or for snacks from the convenience store? Context is everything.

An AI-powered auditing solution like AppZen, on the other hand, is like a watchman equipped with floodlights and a sixth sense for abnormal behavior. The difference between our mature finance AI and traditional auditing tools is night and day. Our AI models grasp not just the 'what' but also the 'why' behind an expense. It's the difference between a tool that merely reads a receipt and one that asks, "Why does this employee have three separate entries for gas in a single day?" These are the kinds of questions that flag otherwise hard-to-find risks and help fundamentally change spend behavior.

It's not just a question of whether we can catch audacious behavior. As long as companies continue to receive "receipts" that are nothing more than photos of a laptop screen or bad handwriting, the answer to the more important question of It's whether we should allow this behavior to exist in the first place will remain a resounding, “No.” As AI auditing tools like AppZen Expense Audit are used more widely, such absurdities may soon become a thing of the past.

Would you agree that the marriage of AI and auditing is a seismic shift that will redefine corporate accountability? Leave your answer in the comments, below.