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Ridiculous things your company has done to reduce travel expenses

Ridiculous things your company has done to reduce travel expenses

Old Aug 29, 2012, 1:17 pm
  #91  
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Per Diem

Any company which is paying its people, both the traveler and an accounts payable type, to total up coffee receipts is crazy.

With the exception of people who have client entertainment responsibilities, per diem based on location makes sense. Who cares whether you choose a $50 room service breakfast and crackers for lunch and dinner or eat nothing until dinner?

Most large businesses have moved to the per diem approach or at least an approach where they look at overall reasonableness vs. productivity. In other words, the person who comes in way over time & again is a problem child, but maybe not if they are generating to dollar business.

The benefit of per diem is that it's a simple line on a form. Day x Rate = Reimbursement.
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 1:53 pm
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Government Rates

The 'Craziest" thing the US government has ever done to reduce cost is to set per diem rates for all travel locations, and to quit collecting receipts for meals and incidental expenses (M&IE)! It is the only intuitive move they ever made. The savings in paper-work and man-hours is literally incalculable. And they have stuck with it for many years. How crazy is that?

My wife recently worked for a small company that required the full restaurant receipt for every meal, not just the credit card total, even from senior management. If you don't trust your employees with M&IE, how can you trust them to help run your company?
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 1:57 pm
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Originally Posted by GRALISTAIR
Only two alcoholic beverages will be expensed per day
Count yourself lucky - that's breakfast taken care of.
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 2:11 pm
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Originally Posted by milesrunner
My wife recently worked for a small company that required the full restaurant receipt for every meal, not just the credit card total, even from senior management. If you don't trust your employees with M&IE, how can you trust them to help run your company?

This is standard.. b/c a lot of people will bring their S.O with them and eat under 1 bill.. thus the itemized receipt requirement.
One can say "if you don't trust you employees".. sure..if everyone just behaved according to rules.. but honestly.. i've seen 25%+ abusing T&E when no itemized receipt is required.
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 2:15 pm
  #95  
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Originally Posted by GarethK
I travel around the UK... much more of a road warrior so limited experience however work wont pay for lunch. Only Dinner & Breakfast - anything in between from a coffee to a sandwich is at your own expense.
That just seems counterproductive. I know my work product suffers if I go that long without eating. I'm sure I could find a workaround if I had to - likely involving a hotel that provided breakfast to elites and a nearby deli open at 8AM to buy a cold lunch sandwich as my expensed "breakfast". Just doesn't seem like the company has much to gain from this policy...


(If the intent is that you're never to eat lunch without a client, and thus always expensing those meals in under a specific client meal policy, that's obviously a different story...)
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 2:21 pm
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.....

Last edited by angatol; Mar 1, 2015 at 3:50 am
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 2:23 pm
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Originally Posted by mecabq
the U.S. State Department is probably the organization in the world whose size, geographic breadth, and resources make it best-positioned to calculate such rates. There is no need to grind your axe at an "Americocentric" approach. It's logical. It would be silly for a company to waste money compiling such a list when they can get it for free (courtesy of the American taxpayer) on the internet. .
These rates have been discussed here on FT before, but to give one example of why you would NOT use a US organisation (with a US organisation's sense of geography), stand at the front door of London Heathrow Terminal 5 and look northwards over the runway 27L threshold. The Sheraton to your half-right is in the London Borough of Hillingdon, and thus gets the London rate of USD 499 a day, whereas the comparable Marriott (with similar rates) to your half-left, equally served by the Heathrow Hoppa hotel bus shuttle, a bit further west along the A4 road, falls into "Other" (because it is over the boundary in Berkshire, with a Slough postal address and postcode on the receipt) and only allows half this amount, USD 255 a day.

Even Liverpool reimburses more. Liverpool !
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 2:29 pm
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Originally Posted by WHBM
These rates have been discussed here on FT before, but to give one example of why you would NOT use a US organisation (with a US organisation's sense of geography), stand at the front door of London Heathrow Terminal 5. The Sheraton to your half-right is in the London Borough of Hillingdon, and thus gets the London rate of USD 499 a day, whereas the comparable Marriott (with similar rates) to your left, equally served by the Heathrow Hoppa hotel bus shuttle, a bit further west along the A4 road, falls into "Other" (because it is over the boundary in Berkshire, with a Slough postal address and postcode on the receipt) and only allows half this amount, USD 255 a day.

Even Liverpool reimburses more. Liverpool !
I still go back to the fact that the main reason private companies use it is to get themselves out of the business of determining the rates. They can go in to their clients and say "we use the GSA rates, which everybody knows are a little on the frugal side." Takes the discussion of specific per diem rates out of the conversation and allows the negotiations to move on to meatier topics.

They aren't perfect, and I'm sure they're somewhat better for domestic U.S. cities than the rest of the world, but they serve the main purpose that a private company needs them to serve.

It then falls upon us, the travelers, to book that Sheraton instead of the Marriott.
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 3:00 pm
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Originally Posted by CMK10
My last company started buying employee's old cars and using them as company cars. I ended up with a 9 year old Land Rover Discovery with over 100,000 miles. They also didn't replace the windshield wipers because "it rarely rains in Las Vegas". Sure enough, a big rain storm happened and I could see out the windshield better with the wipers off
Wow, I hope your company has lawyers ready for the first time somebody gets in an accident.

Mike
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 3:02 pm
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Originally Posted by vmsea
This is standard.. b/c a lot of people will bring their S.O with them and eat under 1 bill.. thus the itemized receipt requirement.
One can say "if you don't trust you employees".. sure..if everyone just behaved according to rules.. but honestly.. i've seen 25%+ abusing T&E when no itemized receipt is required.
Also solved by the per diem.
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 3:08 pm
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Originally Posted by Often1
Also solved by the per diem.
agreed.. per diem is the best in my opinion.
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 3:13 pm
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Originally Posted by sunnyjl
...so I offered her one of my protein bars, and she was aghast that I had paid $3.99 for it. I think they thought I was being pompous with my healthy food, but I know my body, what it can handle, and what it cannot, and what I need to do to be productive. Health doesn't come cheaply!
You know how many kilograms of REAL healthy stuff, like, you know, Bananas, grapes, apples, pairs, peaches, and so on, you could have bought for 3.99$?

I would never ever think about buying one of those "health bars"..

Oh, and pork skin is delicious, of course I wouldn't eat it all day, but as a snack, together with an apple or so, it's definitely better than some overpriced "non-candy" bar..
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 3:18 pm
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Originally Posted by angatol
I imagine the policy is due to the fact that if you work in an office, you typically buy your own lunch anyway. I rarely expense lunch unless I must eat in a restaurant for some reason.
In my office many of us bring our own lunch from home - make a sandwich or have leftovers etc. This has minimal cost to us but cannot be done when traveling. I think it's sensible and fair for a company to pay for lunches when employees are traveling.
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 3:25 pm
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Originally Posted by YuropFlyer
You know how many kilograms of REAL healthy stuff, like, you know, Bananas, grapes, apples, pairs, peaches, and so on, you could have bought for 3.99$?
In the US, approximately one kilogram. Fresh produce is expensive here.
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Old Aug 29, 2012, 3:34 pm
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Originally Posted by Science Goy
In the US, approximately one kilogram. Fresh produce is expensive here.
Sorry - I got the impression that food generally in the US is cheaper than in Europe, especially Switzerland (which is about 50% more expensive than Germany/France) - here, 4$ will buy you about 3-4 bananas and 2-3 apples, which is enough fresh food for about 2 days.. (Bananas are about 3$/kg, apples about the same, grapes varies according to season, non-core one's are 2-4$ per 500g (cheaper if you buy in big quantities, but I'm assuming small-packages only), peaches about 2.5$ per kg, pairs about 2.5$ per kg too, you can get an easy impression here: (Currency roughly is 1:1 against the $)
http://www.aktionis.ch/fruechte+gemuese

I'm really surprised to see fresh fruits being more expensive in the US - why is it like this? I would have thought your government should be interested in having healthy food being sold at affordable costs to fight obesity? If I can get two apples for the same price as a Big Mac, I can imagine most people will choose the Burger over the apples..
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