emma69

I would not charge those items back to the company if I was getting them refunded. It is my personal choice to use a credit card with a fee attached, I could use a free card and expense those items if I preferred.

It's the same as hotel / FF status - if you get free breakfast because you are a Plat, you don't then claim for a paid breakfast. If you get free seat assignments, you don't charge your company the equivalent.

Points aside (as there are clear rules around those) and per diems aside as well since they are a different beast, I don't think the traveler should end up better off by traveling, but nor should they be worse off.

strickerj

evergrn

evergrn

MSPeconomist

emma69

It it was a limited benefit that I would otherwise use personally, then I would choose to use another card for that expense. If it is, say, a $100 per year credit, and I knew I was only likely to use $50, I would have no issue using the other $50 for company expenses. If I would use the $100 later in the year myself, I would probably just use a different card entirely - if for some reason I had to use the card, and would otherwise use the credit myself I would note an exception on my expense voucher, provided the item was within expense policy, with the details of the card etc. and request reimbursement. I would not just put it through as a regular expense, because for me, that situation require a notation should anyone look deeper. I hold myself to pretty high ethical standards, and expect the same of my staff. If one of them did this and told me the circumstances, cool. If they didn't and I later found out, I would wonder why they hadn't been entirely transparent about it.

emma69

I am fine with that - it is an actual expense incurred - what I meant is you wouldn't get free breakfast due to status, then claim $15 for that free breakfast on your expense report (I would hope...)

MSPeconomist

emma69

Yep, I am totally ok with that. I might explain why I didn't get the free one but given how awful some free breakfasts are, I have no issue expensing an alternate breakfast in those circumstances. I do know someone who ate two breakfasts (he had the free hotel one, then came with me to eat again an hour later!) He was super thin as well, I figure he had a tapeworm he had to keep well fed...

MSPeconomist

emma69

In this instance, he was just hungry! And our company has no issue with it - if someone is hungry because they normally eat 5-6 meals a day (I know people who work out heavily often do this), or if jet lag has got the better of you and you are ravenous even when you don't normally eat a lot, food is a basic human need and I would question a company limiting quantity of food (price is another matter perhaps, as I know some companies have limits on meals). That said, I was in Europe with a friend (both there on work) and her company only allowed her a very small amount to spend (it did not cover a starter and main at a mid range Italian restaurant) which I think is pretty silly, employees should be able to eat where they would normally at home.

Often1

It is important to separate out what may be silly policies from the importance of being accurate. If one does not like one's employer's travel policy, either get it changed, live with it, or call your head hunter. There really are employers which require their people to stay at chains which offer an included breakfast. If they do, then expensing a breakfast is a bad idea unless one can provide a specific reason.

The same for companies which do 99% of their travel in small midwestern cities and then send someone to Italy and wonder why a meal is more expensive.

rickg523

^
That made me chuckle.
It's sounds ludicrous, but it happens.
Too long a story for an aside, but that exactly happened to me.

evergrn

If you divulge those types of details to corporate, though, I think chances are good that they will not put much thought into it and decide to not reimburse you. At least that's been my experience.

I too would like to think that I hold myself to high ethical standards. At the same time, I don't want to be shortchanged. I think most of us here would agree that your company should reimburse you for in-flight meal payment transactions that are due AMEx reimbursement per your personal paid benefits; otherwise the company reaps the reward of the benefit that you'd paid for. I don't think there's any doubt about that. What I think constitutes the gray area is whether/not you still have to report to the corporate all these details when you expense these items. It's interesting to hear your opinion, and so it gives me something to think about. But again I think you then risk being shortchanged if you report all those details. If you don't report it and then someone decides to "look deeper," then your defense is that the common sense dictates that these fees should be reimbursed by the company.

emma69

I've actually found the opposite to be true. Because I often provide commentary with my expenses, they very very rarely come back with questions, and I've never had an issue if, say, a receipt does go missing, as they are pretty confident that what I say is true, is true, and that I am not the type to sneak things through (and I keep detailed records to boot). I am also pretty neat about my receipts (sorted by type of expense, date order, neatly clipped etc.) which I think accounting appreciates as it makes their life much easier than the guys (and I am afraid it is men!) who throw any and all scraps of paper in an internal mail envelope and expect people to know what they are (especially if they are not written in a Latin alphabet). As an aside, it is also much easier for me, I use a multi envelope system when travelling to separate by credit card and cash, and by type of expense. There's also a bit of give and take, for example, I had a 15% discount code for an issue on a personal trip (no grey area as to who that code belongs to), but because of my travel patterns, I was not going to be able to use it for a personal trip. I had no hesitation applying it to a work flight, and saving the company a fair chunk of change (business class trans-pac). I document those things as well, more to protect coworkers than virtue signalling (I think!) because otherwise they get 'well Emma found a ticket for $X why did YOURS cost $Y for the same flight??'

I don't end up out of pocket when I travel on business (if you don't count side trips to buy lovely personal things in foreign department stores!) and from time to time when I have an expense that raises eyebrows / is decidedly out of policy (for example, a horribly excessive taxi fee when we were at the mercy of the only taxi that could return us to our hotel late at night, or a client who ordered obscene food and drinks at a dinner) they grant those exceptions pretty easily.