The true costs of manual mileage tracking and reimbursing can often be surprising to companies, especially those not yet adopting modern mileage tracking methods.

According to our internal tracking data, we have discovered that many drivers were inflating their mileage by nearly 30%, potentially costing businesses thousands upon thousands of dollars per year in incorrect and fraudulent reimbursements. Let’s discuss what this means and how companies can use TripLog to protect their financial interests.

Over-Reported Mileage: The Numbers

Between January 2018 and January 2021, we found that roughly 2.8 million trips were overreported. Of the 52.33 million miles reported among those trips, we found that they were inflated by 27.2% for a total of 14.26 million miles.

When drivers were reporting manually (i.e. not using the app to automatically track their mileage), that number grows to 28.9%. At an average of $0.58 per mile over that period, this would account for roughly $8.2 million in incorrect and fraudulent reimbursement.

That figure only takes into account TripLog usage. When you factor in all mobile employees in the US, especially those still tracking their mileage with pen-and-paper logs, the number quickly balloons exponentially.

For example, say a driver took a trip and manually reported that it took them 30 miles when in reality it only took 20. TripLog compares the route recorded by our automatic mileage tracker or a given manual entry to Google Maps’ data.

If Google Maps reports that the drive actually took 20 miles, that can result in overreporting. Thanks to TripLog, those trips were immediately flagged and easily corrected, but companies still using manual reporting and processing methods are far more likely to miss such errors.

The Simple Solution To Over-Reported Mileage

Over-reported mileage is a huge problem for all companies still tracking their team’s mileage manually – but it doesn’t have to be.

Get your team started with TripLog in as little as one hour and stop over-reported mileage in its tracks. Your team will also see massive savings in time and labor as well!

Schedule a complimentary live web demo with one of our mileage experts in as little as 15 minutes to see just how much TripLog can help your company!

Expense Fraud: More Common Than You Think!

According to the Global Business Travel Association, 19% of all expense reports have errors, and it takes nearly 20 minutes to correct these issues. Even if a company employs just a few drivers, these errors can quickly stack up over just one single pay period in terms of cost in incorrect reimbursements and labor.

In fact, the most common type of expense fraud is mileage reimbursement. Employees that conduct business in their own vehicles often pad their mileage amounts in order to receive additional funding from their employer.

Even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, expense reporting fraud was on the rise. According to Chrome River’s 2019 Expense Fraud Survey, an average of 5% of employees committed expense reporting fraud that year. Perhaps most important is how these expenses were being submitted.

Employees were most likely to commit expense reporting fraud when – you guessed it! – they were submitting manual or spreadsheet-tracked receipts. Over 9% of employees who submitted expenses this way have committed fraudulent actions in their expense tracking, typically inflating small expenses that were less likely to be noticed.

Switch to a Modern Solution

The true costs of manual mileage and expense tracking should shock business owners, but there are easy-to-implement solutions. For instance, TripLog has made it possible and affordable for firms to get exact mileage reports, put them all into a readable format, and save time for their accounting team, helping stop fraud in its tracks.

To learn more, schedule a complimentary demo with TripLog today, or take a look at our pricing plans. You can also create an account to start your savings journey today, or download the TripLog app on iOS or Android.