What is an expense reporting app?

An expense reporting application is a desktop or web application that enables users to create expense reports for travel expenses. The app typically includes the ability to upload receipts, select business categories for each receipt, and attach notes with more information about each receipt’s purchase. Some apps also include advanced features such as automated expense tracking, which allows users to track their spending habits over time by adding new receipts through the app. Expense reporting apps are often used by the same users who use expense management apps, travel management apps, and bill payment apps. Some of the most popular expense reporting apps include Expensify, MileIQ, Concur, and Cover. Examples of expense reporting apps built with Crowdbotics:

• An expense reporting web app built for a company in the finance industry.
• An expense reporting and vendor management app with a QR integration built for a company in the restoration business that handles billing, work orders, media storage, project details, materials tracking, and sign-off forms for customers.

What is the typical cost to build an expense reporting app?

An expense reporting app usually costs about $37,500 to build. However, the total cost can be as low as $25,000 or as high as $50,000. An expense reporting app with a low number of features (also known as a minimum viable product, or MVP) will be more affordable than an app that includes all intended functionality. For example, here are some previous expense reporting app price quotes from Crowdbotics:

• $15,000
• $18,000

How long does it take to build an expense reporting app?

An expense reporting app usually takes 220 hours to build. However, an expense reporting app can be built in as few as 120 hours, or in as many as 333 hours. The exact timeline mostly depends on how complicated your specific app is. As a general rule, it will take longer if you require highly custom designs, niche features, complex logic, or non-standard release platforms. For example, some previous expense reporting apps build with Crowdbotics received the following hourly estimates:

• 200
• 240

How to successfully grow your expense reporting application

An expense reporting app can increase its user base by providing a simple and easy-to-use app that makes it easy to track business expenses. In addition to creating a great app, expense reporting apps need to make sure that they have a large pool of users in their target market. A good way to achieve this is by creating a referral program for existing users.

Risks and challenges of building an expense reporting application

An expense reporting app faces legal risks associated with the storage of sensitive personal financial information, as well as security risks from data breaches. Expense reporting apps should ensure that they anonymize any personally identifiable information before storing it in a backend database.