The commute to the office is a daily routine for most people. For a long time, the choice of transportation was largely dominated by cars. However, due to flexible work models, rising energy prices, and increased environmental awareness, people’s mobility behavior has drastically changed and has become significantly more multimodal. Companies need to respond to this shift, and they have ways to do so. By offering flexible mobility budgets and employee benefits like a company bike or the Germany job ticket, companies can not only financially support their employees’ daily commute but also facilitate their mobility with the right tool—while making corporate mobility more sustainable. These software solutions are beneficial for all companies, whether they are global corporations, medium-sized enterprises, small businesses, or start-ups.
In the following, we present the top 10 tools for managing employee mobility within companies, and clarify what exactly a mobility budget tool for employee mobility is and what additional capabilities it should have.
A mobility budget platform allows mobility offers for employees to be managed easily and digitally. The platform can encompass employee benefits, alternatives to existing mobility offers, or the entire employee mobility. Ideally, it should depict the complete mobility strategy and promote sustainable mobility behavior.
A mobility budget platform usually offers maximum flexibility by combining various mobility modules, such as a flexible mobility budget, Germany job ticket and other public transport offers, bike leasing or subscriptions, car subscriptions, or fuel and charging cards.
As a digital HR tool, it integrates payroll and accounting, thereby reducing process efforts and ensuring automated and tax-compliant billing.
Professional mobility budget tools offer a range of benefits for all parties involved in corporate mobility, including employers, HR and finance departments, fleet managers, and the employees themselves.
The key advantages of an external mobility budget platform and their essential features include:
Create the work place of tomorrow with NAVIT. We are happy to support you with designing the best mobility solution for your company. Get in touch with us!
Contact us
The most important aspects that a good mobility budget platform should cover include:
How employees can pay with the mobility budget and how it is billed determines the choice of platform and provider. Generally, there are three different options, and some providers offer a mix of solutions.
Employees receive a virtual prepaid card credited with the mobility budget every month. They can use this card, for example, to buy public transport tickets, share vehicles, or refuel or charge the company or private car by paying with the card in the mobility provider’s app.
belmoto
Belmoto advises companies on their corporate mobility. As part of their consulting, belmoto offers solutions for corporate mobility management, including fleet solutions and company bike leasing, as well as a mobility card, the belmoto Mobility Card, which allows employees to receive a mobility budget and independent access to mobility offers.
Spendit
Spendit is not purely a mobility budget platform. Rather, it is a general benefits provider that includes a mobility budget card in its product range, alongside the classic non-cash benefit card and the digital meal allowance. Companies can also offer their employees the Germany ticket as a job ticket through Spendit. Spendit’s functions include easy integration into payroll and certified CO2 compensation of the entire mobility budget through the initiatives of its partner Project Climate.
Unlike the prepaid card, with this solution, employees submit their privately paid mobility expenses within the mobility budget in the form of invoices or tickets either to the employer or directly in a mobility budget app. Employees scan their receipts and tickets via the provider's app. The incurred mobility expenses are reimbursed to the employee via payroll the following month. Providers of mobility budget apps try to automate this process as much as possible and optimize it for companies.
Circula
Circula is an expense platform for all expenses incurred by employees: travel expenses, credit cards, and corporate benefits. Naturally, the mobility budget is part of the portfolio. Employees submit their travel expense receipts via the Circula app. Circula checks their legal and tax compliance and calculates the maximum net salary optimization. Data transfer runs directly to the company’s payroll. The company can then automatically pay out the reimbursement to the employees with the next salary.
Lofino
Like Circula, Lofino aims to bundle benefit offers on an all-in-one budget platform. The software organizes and optimizes corporate benefits and mobility budgets, providing them to employees as a flexible budget solution via an app. The provision and billing of the mobility budget are carried out analogously to Circula via the receipt scanning function and subsequent reimbursement of travel expenses. Since 2022, Lofino has been part of the JobRad Group.
Probonio
Probonio has also proven itself as a corporate benefit platform in many companies. The mobility budget needs to be configured once and can be adjusted at any time. Employees submit receipts for public transport tickets or other rides digitally via the app and have the travel costs reimbursed through their salary. The billing is GoBD-compliant and tax-optimized. In the app, employees can view and evaluate their mobility expenses at a glance.
SAP Concur
SAP Concur is one of the world’s leading providers of integrated solutions for travel and expense management. Therefore, it’s only logical that the platform also offers a solution for the mobility budget. SAP Concur has three different tools for implementing the mobility budget. With Concur Expense, companies can automatically calculate travel allowances, Budget provides companies with a comprehensive overview of all employee expenses, and with Expenselt, employees can capture and submit receipts directly with their smartphone.
Our mobility experts at NAVIT would love to share their knowledge with you about the new mobility product. Feel free to get in touch with us!
Get infoIn the third mobility budget solution, employees have access to an app provided by the mobility budget provider. The route planning, booking, and payment of mobility services are done directly through integrations in this app. The mobility budget is available to employees as app credit. Unlike the second solution, employees do not have to pay in advance. Billing via the mobility budget provider’s app automatically sends the receipts to the employer.
Bonvoyo
Bonvoyo is the mobility budget product of Deutsche Bahn. Companies can provide their employees with a flexible budget via the Bonvoyo app. Companies can also set a specific usage framework within certain user groups. The mobility budget can be used for both private and business mobility. Available are primarily Deutsche Bahn offers, such as bus and train, Call-a-Bike bikesharing, and Flinkster carsharing. Planning, booking, and managing trips are done directly in the app.
Ideally, the mobility budget platform includes several or all of the solutions listed above. This way, employees have maximum flexibility and the greatest comfort in using the mobility budget and the digital app.
Mobiko
Mobiko has also moved towards a mix of solutions for its mobility budget platform. Previously, employees could only submit incurred mobility expenses through the receipt scanning function in the Mobiko app. They would receive a tax-compliant and optimized reimbursement with the salary transfer. Starting mid-2024, employees will also be able to pay for their mobility with a mobility card.
NAVIT
With the NAVIT mobility budget platform, companies can manage the entire employee mobility on one platform. The NAVIT platform eliminates isolated solutions by integrating the entire range of mobility, providing easy and flexible access to sharing services, the ability to rent or lease bikes and cars, use fuel and charging cards, or buy public transport tickets.
Selecting the right mobility budget tool always starts with the question of what the tool needs to do and cover.
These are just a few of many questions that need to be answered on the way to the optimal corporate mobility strategy and choosing a suitable mobility budget platform.
Whether a complete mobility management system, an app with a virtual mobility card, pure travel cost reimbursement, or a helpful extra feature for more convenience in managing corporate benefits: Software solutions to support and manage employee mobility are a model with a future. Why? Because mobility offers will continue to increase and employees’ mobility behavior will continue to change, becoming more multimodal and flexible. This means the entire process, from managing individual mobility modules to user management to tax-compliant billing of transportation modes, will become increasingly complex. With a mobility budget tool, employers can intuitively and easily plan, manage, and control mobility benefits for their employees, providing them with a flexibly usable mobility budget via an easy-to-use app.
This saves HR and benefits managers work, time, and in most cases, unnecessary expenses—and might even reveal new ways to make employee mobility more sustainable.
Sign up for our newsletter to receive the latest insights about our mobility solution products like the 49 eurojob ticket.
