Expense Agent: Finance Controlling (2026 release wave 1)
Expense Agent walkthrough in Business Central: how an employee's expense flows through dimensions, expense report, posting (project and employee ledger entries), employee payment via the payment journal, and project billable costs. Status of the feature is not stated in the facts.
- Introduction to the Expense Agent
- Expense submission and dimension tracking
- Expense report creation and billable information
- Posting the expense report and ledger entries
- Employee payment processing
- Project cost tracking and completion
Overview
The video follows an expense submitted in the web app by an employee, Lena, and shows what the Expense Agent does behind the scenes as data moves through Business Central. It covers dimensions, billable information, posting, payment and project cost tracking.
Default dimensions on the employee record, such as department and sales person, are pulled through to the expense. The employee cannot set dimensions herself. An accountant can add or move dimensions afterwards. Posting the expense report creates project and employee ledger entries, and the employee can then be paid from the payment journal using the new employee account type.
Key points
- Default dimensions on the employee record (for example department and sales person) flow automatically into expenses the employee submits.
- The employee cannot specify dimensions herself; the accountant can add or move dimensions afterwards (in the demo the accountant added a business group).
- Billable information on an expense lets the employee assign a customer, the account in the system it should go to, and a project and project task number; these sources combine into a new set of dimensions.
- Posting an expense report creates the posted expense report, project ledger entries and employee ledger entries, the last tracking the money owed to the employee.
- From the employee card, a Pay employee function shows outstanding employee expenses and creates a payment in the normal payment journal.
- The payment journal now has an ‘employee’ account type; previously only vendor was available.
- Expenses assigned to a project show up under the project’s billable cost, posted as an expense type such as other travel expenses.
Features
Every feature below: status not stated, demoed.
| Feature | At |
|---|---|
| Expense Agent | 0:00 |
| Default dimensions on employee records | 0:52 |
| Billable information on expenses | 1:54 |
| Posted expense report ledger entries | 2:42 |
| Pay employee function | 3:31 |
| Employee account type in payment journal | 3:56 |
| Project billable cost tracking for expenses | 4:20 |
AL objects mentioned
As heard in the captions. A name that matches one object page by exact type and name links to it; the others stay as named.
- other “posted expense report” at 2:52
- other “project ledger entry” at 3:06
- other “employee ledger entry” at 3:06
- other “payment journal” at 3:56
Quotes
- 0:00 “Welcome to this expense agent series where we are going to look behind the scenes what happens in BC when somebody makes expenses in”
- 0:28 “And we’re going to see a bit about how data is flowing through our system automatically. So one thing that Lena cannot do herself”
- 1:30 “And then the accountant can choose to add or move um dimensions. So in this case the accountant has added a business group.”
- 2:05 “And there she can assign the uh expense to a customer. She can even specify which account in our system it should go to,”
- 3:06 “And there’s also a ledger entry for the employee, because now we owe Lena this money.”
- 3:56 “And as you can see that we now have an account type that’s called employee. Previously, it would have been only a vendor, but”
Presenters (as heard): Lena.