Zoho Expense Review and Pricing for 2022

Zoho Expense is one of Zoho’s cloud-based applications in the Zoho software-as-a-service (SaaS) environment. It’s an expense tracking app aimed at streamlining travel and expense management for growing businesses. Zoho Expense works seamlessly with Zoho Books, one of our choices for best small business accounting software. Small businesses and freelancers can choose the free plan for up to three users or select one of the paid plans for more users. Monthly pricing for paid plans is $8 (Premium) and $12 (Enterprise) per active user. Users can access the app from their desktop, smartphone, or tablet.

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What We Recommend Zoho Expense For

Zoho Expense is our overall best business expense tracker apps for tracking, recording, reviewing, approving, and reimbursing expenses. It speeds up the recording and approval process without the need for excessive paper documentation. Solopreneurs and freelancers can enjoy its free version while larger companies can use its Premium or Enterprise plans, depending on their needs.

Zoho Is Especially Good For

• Free expense tracking: Zoho Expense offers a free plan intended for freelancers and small businesses on a limited budget. The free plan is for up to three users only and is ideal for simple expense tracking. It has 5GB of receipt storage, which is more than enough for freelancers or small businesses that don’t have a lot of expenses to track.
• Expense approval for employees on trips or fieldwork: Employees only need an internet connection and the Zoho App to record and submit an expense. With Zoho Expense, managers need not wait for their employees to come back to submit their expenses. Zoho Expense lets employees immediately submit on the go.
• Companies that are already using Zoho apps: When using Zoho Expense, you only need to have a Zoho account. You just log in with one account, and you get access to all of the Zoho apps you’ve subscribed to. So, companies using Zoho apps like Zoho CRM or Zoho Books won’t have a hard time integrating with Zoho Expense.
• Companies with employees working remotely or in different branches, cost centers, or departments: Zoho Expense can group expense reports based on the source of the expense. If your company has different working groups or departments, the app can classify expenses on specific reports that belong to the group. In return, it’s easier to review, approve, and reimburse expenses.

Zoho Expense Is Not a Good Fit For

• Those looking for an easy-to-learn interface: Zoho Expense isn’t an app that you can learn in one day; it’ll take several days to a week to master the flow and functions of the app. If you’re looking for something more straightforward and less complex, FreshBooks is the app for you.
• Businesses with less than 500 users that need Enterprise features, such as multilocation management, multibranch management, travel manager: Zoho Expense’s Enterprise plan requires a minimum of 500 users, so companies with fewer than that’ll be required to pay for users they don’t need if they want the Enterprise plan benefits. A great alternative would be Emburse Abacus since higher-tier plans are custom-priced for the features and users your business needs.
• Companies with minor expense sources: Zoho Expense isn’t an exact fit if your company only has basic expenses like salaries and wages, utilities, and office expenses. Although you can still track your expenses with Zoho, you won’t need its more advanced features, such as travel expense management for employees in fieldwork). Instead, Quickbooks Online is a practical alternative, and its built-in expense tracker would be enough for your needs.

Zoho Expense Pros and Cons

Zoho Expense Pricing

Zoho Expense offers three plans: Free, Premium, and Enterprise. The Free plan is best for small businesses with few expenses while higher-level plans are best for growing businesses. For medium-sized businesses, the Premium plan is ideal because it offers unlimited users and charges only active users monthly. The Enterprise plan is best for companies with a workforce of more than 500. If you have a small business with more than three employees, our best recommendation is the Premium plan.

Zoho Expense Features

Zoho Expense is devoted to expense tracking, especially for travel-related expenses. Zoho Expense puts you at an advantage compared to other expense trackers because it works and integrates with Zoho Books, the company’s dedicated accounting software. However, QuickBooks Online and Xero users can integrate Zoho Expense as well.

Dashboard

The dashboard is available in the Admin view. Companies can delegate certain employees to have the Admin role so they can oversee everything in the process. Only users with the Admin role can add Submitters, Approvers, or other Admins. In the dashboard, you can see an overview of everything that’s happening, from pending trips to top violators. Overall, the dashboard provides managers with useful information about the business:

Zoho Admin View Dashboard

Adding Users on Zoho Expense via Admin View

Home Screen

The home screen welcomes users with a Drag & Drop Receipts feature. You can auto-scan receipts, upload them from your computer or the cloud, or manually enter them. This screen will appear only to employees with a Submitter role. Being one of the best receipt scanner apps available today, Zoho Expense makes documentation easier and faster:

Zoho Expense home screen for submitters

When manually entering expenses, you can click New Expense, and a popup window will appear. You can attach receipts here as well. When enumerating expenses, you can either choose a single-expense mode or an itemized-expense mode. After filling up the fields, you can either click Save and Close or Save and New:

Expense tab showing all unreported expenses

Expense Tab

When you visit the Expense tab, you’ll see all your expenses categorized as Unreported. To report expenses, just click Add to Report, and a popup window will appear. If you want to add it to existing reports, click the report’s name from the drop box:

Adding expenses with uploaded invoice

If you want to see all your expenses, click All Expenses to view all unreported and reported expenses.

Adding Categories

If you want to add a new type of expense, you can create a new category by clicking the + button in the category dropbox. You can set the category name and make it a subcategory of an existing category. You can also add an account code and a description:

Adding New Categories while entering a new record

Reporting Expenses, Submitting Reports, and Approvals

After creating a report, all reports will be categorized as Unsubmitted. By clicking the Submit button, a popup window will appear, prompting you to enter the approver’s name. Once submitted for approval, the approver will see the report on their end:

Report summary

Adding Expenses to a report

After viewing the report, the approver may reject the report and enter the reason for rejection in the popup textbox window. Once rejected, the report will be categorized as Rejected. The accountable person may re-submit the report after addressing the reason for rejection:

Submitting Reports and Selecting the Approver

Approved Report window

Once the report is good to go, it can now be reimbursed by clicking Record Reimbursement. If the user doesn’t have a corporate card, the reimbursement will have to be made manually. Otherwise, all expenses charged to the corporate card will feed into Zoho Expense approval and reimbursements automatically.

After clicking Record Reimbursement, the report’s status will be marked Reimbursed:

Reimbursement Screen

Budgeting

Zoho Expense also lets you create budgets for your expenses. Click the Budgets tab in the admin view of the dashboard, and it’ll show you how to create a new budget.

Budget screen

Advances

Apart from expenses, you can also insert advances from employees. Advances use the same process as Expenses. After adding an Advance entry, it’ll appear in the Advances tab. You can then click Submit. If the user has existing unreported expenses, Zoho will ask to include unreported expenses automatically in a new report.

Once submitted and approved, the advance will offset the expense when the expense is incurred and submitted. After submitting, the report will be marked as Reimbursed:

Recording Advances made to employees

Integrations

Zoho Expense can integrate with third-party software as well. For example, it can work well with accounting software and enterprise resource planning (ERP) software like Oracle, Sage, SAP, and Xero. However, it works best if you use it alongside Zoho Books. For travel, you can use ITILITE or GetThere for bookings and reservations. Zoho Expense can also integrate with Uber and Lyft for ride-hailing apps. Other integrations include G Suite, Office 365, and Slack.

Mobile Apps

Zoho Expense has a mobile app that can be downloaded from the App Store or Google Play store. The app contains the same features as the web version. However, submitters can use mileage tracking through the app to track travel expenses. They can also submit payments and reports through the app for faster reporting of expenses.

Security

Zoho Expense includes secure sockets layer (SSL) encryption and multifactor authentication (MFA) to prevent unauthorized access. Additionally, you can set up permission access to control what employees within your organization can see and do. If your company is already using other Zoho apps, Zoho has an SSO feature. You only need to sign in to your Zoho account, and you’re logged in to all Zoho apps automatically.

Zoho Expense Alternatives

Bottom Line

Zoho Expense is a great auxiliary app to supplement your dedicated accounting software. It helps speed up expense recording, approval, and reimbursement processing. Moreover, users of Zoho apps only need one account to integrate with Zoho Expense easily. Overall, Zoho Expense is an excellent app for tracking and managing expenses.

However, small businesses with fewer than 500 employees that need features like multilocation or multibranch management may find that Emburse Abacus is a better option. Aside from this limitation, Zoho Expense is still worth considering if you’re planning to expand to other Zoho apps like Zoho Books or Zoho CRM.