That does make a big difference I think. I have a good friend who works for the UK subsiduary of one of the worlds largest manufacturing companies. I consider the travel rules he has to work to are terribly petty and punitive - to the extent that they probably work against the organisation.

They set rules over 3 employee grades on how much can be spent on a hotel, on lunch, dinner etc. From what I can see this means everyone tries really hard to spend up to that limit every single time - as some form of "entitlement" and it sometimes works against the company. For example, if arriving at a hotel late at night and leaving early in the morning (when none of the hotel facilities really matter) something like a Holiday Inn Express, Mercure or Novotel would be perfectly fine. Instead my friend and colleagues seem to go out of their way to find a Crowne Plaza, Sheraton or even an Intercontinental type place so they spend their "entitled" limit.

My friend last year travelled a few times by himself and took the sensible approach (and saved the company some money in the process) and to his surprise his colleagues had a bit of a go at him. "You can't stay in those sorts of hotels", they said. "You'll ruin it for the rest of us as the company might expect us all to as well"

I've always thought a rigid and inflexible, strictly adhered to travel policy both pi$$es off the employee and frequently works against the company setting it