Extensity, Inc., a leading provider of Web-based operational cost management applications, along with VISA USA, Deloitte & Touche, Internet Travel Network (ITN) and Cisco Systems, will sponsor six free seminars in April and May on Travel & Entertainment (T&E) Management Best Practices. During the half-day seminars, financial and travel managers will learn how Internet-based automation can help them achieve optimal efficiency and realize significant bottom-line savings in processing T&E costs, which represent the third-largest non-production cost facing corporations. Leading travel, accounting, and software vendors will discuss best practices for T&E management, and representatives from major corporations will discuss their own experiences, and financial results, with T&E automation.

Similar seminars offered on the West Coast last November met with tremendous success, spurring Extensity to expand the program into the Midwest and eastern regions of the country to meet the high demand. Jack Gonzalez, Director of Travel Services at Sony Pictures Entertainment, who attended a West Coast seminar, said, “The T&E Best Practices Seminar I attended was the most pertinent and informative presentation of online booking, card systems and expense reporting I could imagine. The speakers covered it all.”

With T&E expenses representing a significant percentage of operational costs in the budget of the average corporation, the potential for cost savings gained through best practices implementation is huge. By replacing manual, paper-based travel planning and expense reporting with an automated process, companies can increase process efficiency and realize cost savings that go straight to the bottom line. In addition, automation can improve compliance with corporate travel policies and help companies gather comprehensive T&E-related data for ongoing financial optimization. Attendees to the Extensity seminar series will hear how major corporations have improved productivity and realized cost savings through T&E automation, and how automation can be implemented through a system that leverages existing Internet and intranet technologies, corporate cards, Internet booking systems and network solutions.

The seminars will be held:

Tuesday, April 13 at the Boston Back Bay Hilton in Boston, Mass.
Wednesday, April 14 at the New York Hilton & Towers in New York, NY
Thursday, April 15 at the Atlanta Marriott Marquis in Atlanta, Ga.
Tuesday, May 11 at Iron Mike’s Grille at the Tremont Hotel in Chicago, Ill.
Wednesday, May 12 at the Cincinnatian Hotel in Cincinnati, Ohio
Thursday, May 13 at the Weston Galleria in Dallas, Tex.

The agenda will begin with a presentation on “T&E Management Best Practices: Maximizing Efficiency while Minimizing Costs,” by featured keynote speakers from VISA USA and Deloitte & Touche. Following the keynote address, financial and travel managers will gain insight into corporate travel policy compliance strategies, Internet-based end-to-end T&E automation, and the role of intelligent, scalable network solutions in successful best practice implementations from Extensity and the company’s partners, Internet Travel Network (ITN) and Cisco Systems.

Representatives from major corporations that have automated T&E to support best practices will share their experiences in a panel discussion and question-and-answer session addressing on-line booking, T&E expense reporting, leveraging corporate card services, and integration of T&E automation with back-end accounting systems.

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