The UK Bribery Act 2010 introduced a new crime of failure to prevent bribery, which means organisations need to demonstrate they have adequate procedures to prevent corrupt practices. Failure to do so could expose the business and its senior managers to unlimited fines, exclusion from government business or even a jail sentence.
The act places real obligations on directors and senior management to demonstrate reasonable and proportionate behaviour particularly around hospitality and entertainment expenses.
Expense claims that are associated with travel and entertainment spend must be validated against clearly defined boundaries of what is acceptable. To ensure they comply with the law, and minimise the associated personal and corporate risk, organisations will need to put in place robust employee expense and entertainment tracking, analysis and reporting mechanisms, enforcing policies and making it easy for employees to demonstrate that an expense incurred is not a bribe. Implementing an expense management solution is therefore mission critical for businesses.
