Each year, thousands of UMass employees travel for university business or make appropriate business expense purchases that require reimbursement. It’s an important part of the work across campuses for research, fundraising, recruitment, and academic and athletic programs. The current process for requesting travel and completing expense reports is inefficient and cumbersome. The technology used to support T&E processes is antiquated and outdated.
Speed, efficiency, and compliance. International Data Corporation (IDC) reports that organizations can expect significant improvement in the time it takes for employees to request and book travel, complete and expense reports, and ensure alignment with University policies and administrative standards. Many of our University peers have invested in modern technology to support their T&E function bringing significant positive results.
The future state of T&E will comprise of two fully integrated systems, HX Global (Travel Registry) and SAP Concur (T&E system).
The project team will include representatives from all campuses and members of the President’s Office.
Project Fast Lane officially kicked off in December 2022 and campuses are meeting with UMPO Team Members to review kickoff materials this month and into January 2023. The project is estimated to conclude in the Fall of 2023 with a campus rollout. For more information on the timeline refer to the Project Fast Lane Timeline page.
The Travel Policy covers students, and the implementation of the new Travel Registry technology will also cover students. Student travel booking and expense reporting is not included.
We are evaluating our travel management companies as part of the project. We will continue to use The Travel Collaborative for “travel agency” (not online) travel booking, but we may use a new travel management company for online booking.
A variety of training options will be available, including recorded/self-paced training, virtual/live training, on campus/live training, virtual/drop in sessions
We anticipate a full campus rollout in the fall and winter. If your expense report is processed prior to that current processes and systems will be used.
Our website includes a list of questions received on the project grouped by topic. We will be updating our website with lots of resources for uses including job aids and training videos. We hope to make this flexible to find information in a number of different ways.
Concur will replace PeopleSoft for expense reports.
Training will be scheduled closer to when you will have access to the systems.