Water.org is a global non-profit organization working to bring water and sanitation to the world – making it safe, accessible, and cost-effective.
Water.org employees travel around the world, resulting in extensive reporting of business and travel expenses.
Water.org automated its expense reporting, eliminated paper reports, and streamlined its approval process through Zoho Expense.
The shift to Zoho Expense decreased the workload for Water.org's accountants, reduced paperwork for everyone, and freed up staff time to focus on their vision of safe water and sanitation for all.
Water.org is an international non-profit organization that has positively transformed millions of lives around the world with access to safe water and sanitation. Founded by Gary White and Matt Damon, Water.org pioneers market-driven financial solutions to the global water crisis. For more than 25 years, they've been providing families with hope, health and bright futures. Expanding upon the success of WaterCredit, which helps bring small loans and expert resources together to provide household water and toilet solutions, they work with and through partners to increase access to financing for those who need it most. Since their founding, they have empowered more than 30 million people in 17 countries with access to safe water, sanitation, and the hope, health, and opportunities these resources bring.
With employees travelling around the world, manually managing expenses was becoming an inefficient task for Water.org’s finance team. Gathering receipts and expense reports, and getting them reviewed, was often a time-consuming job.
With the cash advance feature, employees are given the funds to pay for their business travel before they leave.
When Water.org automated its expenses using Zoho Expense, the finance team’s job was significantly simplified. The Zoho Expense - QuickBooks Online integration helps them sync and automatically transfer data from Zoho Expense to QuickBooks Online. This also helps ensure that the organization's financial data is accurate before being pushed into QuickBooks Online. Additionally, Water.org rolled out a cash advance system for travelling employees that could be automatically tracked and accounted for in their books.
With Zoho Expense, Water.org employees are now saving a substantial amount of time which used to be spent on saving paper receipts and gathering expense reports. The finance team now shares a consistent, lightweight process for reviewing the reports submitted by the employees.
The new solution includes features which increase transparency between the administration and employees, like cash advances and approval workflows for submitted reports. With the cash advance feature, employees are given the funds to pay for their business travel before they leave. Upon return, employees simply upload their receipts, and administrators gain a clear picture of how and where the money was spent. For post-trip expense reports, the approval workflow offers employees a way to track their expense reports and see their reimbursement status in real time. Water.org is saving time through additional transparency and efficiency in their expense reporting, and can stay focused on reaching more people with access to safe water and sanitation.
