My old company had a fairly stringent policy with respect to per diems, travel, mobile communications, etc.

1) Per diems - $40 per day allowed. However, $8 was designated as breakfast, $12 for lunch, and $20 for dinner. You must show the itemized receipts for each meal. If you elected to not eat breakfast, then you simply lost that $8 out of your per diem. If you exceed the per diem on any meal, you pay out of your own pocket the difference. No alcohol allowed at any time!!! No hotel that I have ever stayed at has offered breakfast for under $12. Not all *wood properties offer a free continental. Client lunches/dinners were OK but an itemized receipt must accompany (and expect it to be scrutinized - as in, "Did you really need to order a $75 bottle of wine? Didn't they have any $50 bottles?)

2) Airfare - lowest fare should be accepted however, if there was a business reason to choose another airline and/or itinerary (ie due to flight flexibility, stopovers, etc.) then we could choose it. However we needed to provide written justification and submit that with our expense claim.

3) Hotel - list of preferred hotels in each major city. Not really a big deal because they covered all of the major chains. No in-room movies allowed and absolutely no mini-bar.

4) Mobile Communications- each year you needed to justify why you needed a cell phone. You were only allowed one communication device (ie. if you had a cell phone, no blackberry and vice versa). No broadband hookup allowed in hotel rooms, dial up only (and you needed to use a calling card at that).

I averaged 110-120 travel days a year for the last 3 years and had to put up with this **it. I no longer work for this organization. I understand the need to control expenses, but this place got ridiculous.