eigenvector

The bonus part especially doesn't scale. The biggest factor in determining our corporate profit share last year was a 3 billion EUR writedown we took on some failed nuclear power plant project, not whether somebody booked a Hilton instead of Holiday Inn.

CanuckFlyHigh

haha touche.

Often1

Why travel at all? Your travel spend will be $0 and you will have all that those travel $ to divvy up in the corporate profit share.

Presumably there is a business purpose both to any travel and the nature of the travel, e.g., whether you sleep on a park bench in the winter or a hotel bed.

Steve M

"We're going to do things as cheaply as possible, no matter how much money it costs!"

d3vi0uz

Ha! Good one!

lalaisgongon

Do you happen to be in pharma/med/consumer?

TTT

My company just introduced a new "enhancement" to our expense policy that I would love to get an opinion on.

We have a few regional offices throughout the country. When traveling for team meetings we generally meet at those locations. Most of those locations have on-site cafeteria facilities. A recent change to the expense policy prohibits reimbursement for breakfast and lunch when traveling to a regional office with a cafeteria (prior, the policy just prohibited reimbursement for purchases at the cafeteria).

Is this unique? It's really grinding my gears as my annual team meeting is scheduled for next week.

Edited: even if I left the office and went to an offsite location for breakfast/lunch, I would still not get it reimbursed because I had the cafeteria as an option.

emma69

If the food provided in the cafeteria is free, I understand the policy. If it isn't then that sounds weird to me (e.g. our Paris office had food provided on site, free of charge, so I couldn't claim for lunch when working there).

TTT

Yeah, I would agree if it were free but our cafeterias are not. They are subsidized some (i.e. a sandwich is ~$4, a hot plate is ~$6-$8), but all items have some charge.

mdkowals

It can be normal, if the host of the meeting is paying for it. It's not uncommon for our meetings to have a breakfast spread out from 7:30-8:00 for a little mingling before a meeting 8AM start time. With lunch it's not uncommon for us to cater it as a group for meetings or all go to the cafeteria with something like an $8 lunch card provided by the host.


Still seems like a blanket policy that can be asking for trouble. Does the cafeteria consider all possible dietary constraints when arranging and cooking their menu? Last week I was travelling with a gluten free vegetarian, she went to the grocery store and just brought her own food in with her and ate with us in the cafeteria. She was allowed to expense the grocery store trips (that eventually became lunch).

TTT

This is a blanket policy, regardless of other catering at meetings. In the case of my upcoming team meeting, breakfasts and lunches are not provided and will not be reimbursed since we are meeting at a location with a cafeteria.

I agree, for a conference type setup where meals are provided then one should also not be able to expense them (assuming they meet dietary requirements).

According to the policy, even if the cafeteria wasn't used a meal could not be reimbursed since a cafeteria was available. So even if the cafeteria didn't offer every dietary option, one could still not get the meal reimbursed.

Efrem

I suppose their reasoning is that you'd probably eat at your home location cafeteria if you were there, and the cafeteria at a remote location doesn't cost any more than that.

However, I don't see how they can make that blanket assumption. Whenever I worked at places with company cafeterias, some people ate at the cafeteria, some brought food from home, and some went out. I don't think their logic, which is basically the same as saying "your salary is intended to cover the cost of lunches at the company cafeteria," holds water (or any other beverage).

RichMSN

The sad thing is that some bean counter is patting himself on the back over coming up with such an employee-unfriendly policy.

TTT

That's a good thought. We have a lot of employees who split time between two of our offices (they are only an hour apart). I could see the firm wanting to limit those employees assigned to office A but working from office B getting a meal allowance.

In my case, I am a "virtual" employee with no assigned office. As you note, I would otherwise make my breakfast and lunch at home for a fraction of the cafeteria cost.

Yeah, all in the name of "corporate responsibility" and "cost savings".

Proudelitist

Unless the cafeteria is free, I don't see a huge amount of savings in such a policy. Sure, it may be cheaper than the local pricey steakhouse and getting rid of that behavior may be behind the policy, but it could be MORE expensive than another place. If you have an employee who likes to go to McDonalds for lunch, that employee may end up spending more at the cafeteria. My company has a cafeteria and it's pretty good, and not necessarily cheap. The average lunch will run you about 15 to 20 dollars. I know I could eat for less at several places around the neighborhood.