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Business travel - expensing refunded transactions

Business travel - expensing refunded transactions

Old Apr 8, 2019, 7:15 am
  #46  
 
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Old Apr 8, 2019, 7:20 am
  #47  
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Originally Posted by nookanaya
I would first just mention it to my manager. In the scenario of a fully-refunded room night there might be general agreement that the company should get reimbursed. If it's for something trivial like a $10 breakfast that was refunded, I think there would be general agreement that it would not be worth everyone's time to pay that back.
The company should not get the full refund when it was the employee who was inconvenienced and more importantly took the initiative to make a complaint resulting in compensation. If I know in advance my efforts to seek redress for poor treatment are only going to line my employer's pockets then I am not going to spend an instant of my time complaining about anything.
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Last edited by Badenoch; Apr 8, 2019 at 10:23 am
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Old Apr 8, 2019, 9:58 am
  #48  
 
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Originally Posted by FlyingHighlander
My corporate Amex is not on my credit report at all. Are you saying if I missed a payment it wouldn't suddenly show up?
obviously some data I don’t have to say definitively... if you have a corporate business green card, then per the Amex terms and card agreement, failure to pay or excessive lateness may result in Amex filing a negative credit report entry. If the card doesn’t show on your history at all, I don’t know what to say. Maybe you have a special agreement.

I am am actually going to go check if mine is on my history right now. Nonetheless, the agreement applicable to me implies that my credit report was pulled, checked, and may be updated going forward. I made it very clear to my employer that late payments due to their procrastination would not be good as that would tarnish my unblemished credit.
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Old Apr 8, 2019, 4:19 pm
  #49  
 
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I would like opinions on this issue in regards to cc "freebies". When my husband is on a business trip and uses his PAMEX for inflight wifi we get a statement credit that is automatic BUT it takes away from what we would use for personal travel. I always make sure he submits it as an expense since he is actually using it for work email. FWIW, he can go through this credit in January before we actually to get to any personal travel. How do/would you handle this?
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Old Apr 8, 2019, 4:33 pm
  #50  
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Originally Posted by hipquest
I would like opinions on this issue in regards to cc "freebies". When my husband is on a business trip and uses his PAMEX for inflight wifi we get a statement credit that is automatic BUT it takes away from what we would use for personal travel. I always make sure he submits it as an expense since he is actually using it for work email. FWIW, he can go through this credit in January before we actually to get to any personal travel. How do/would you handle this?
My take is simple - who paid for the annual fee of the card?

If you or you husband did, that means you should submit the expenses for reimbursement.

I will make it even further. If your husband is not exempted, your husband should make sure that he would be paid for it's work.
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Old Apr 8, 2019, 7:11 pm
  #51  
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Originally Posted by hipquest
I would like opinions on this issue in regards to cc "freebies". When my husband is on a business trip and uses his PAMEX for inflight wifi we get a statement credit that is automatic BUT it takes away from what we would use for personal travel. I always make sure he submits it as an expense since he is actually using it for work email. FWIW, he can go through this credit in January before we actually to get to any personal travel. How do/would you handle this?
The answer seems simple.

What is your husband's employer's policy?

This can be rationalized any number of different ways, but the fact remains that he presumably has agreed to be bound by the policies and that is the end of the discussion.

If the question is, what would I do as an employer, the answer is simple. Small potato stuff such as this detracts from business operations. The employee gets the statement credit.
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Old Apr 8, 2019, 9:46 pm
  #52  
 
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Originally Posted by Often1
The answer seems simple.

What is your husband's employer's policy?

This can be rationalized any number of different ways, but the fact remains that he presumably has agreed to be bound by the policies and that is the end of the discussion.

If the question is, what would I do as an employer, the answer is simple. Small potato stuff such as this detracts from business operations. The employee gets the statement credit.
its defintely a bit of a grey area sometimes. I have seen corporate travel policies that prohibit reimbursement of services obtained for business use via the use of reward points or similar. That is primarily to prevent flights and hotels being booked on points and reimbursement sought in cash, however they grey area in my mind is over items like free Uber credits from Amex Plat, wifi passes, or expensing $10 for breakfast that you got for free in a lounge (via a paid for membership of whatever sort).

My employer usually takes the view of - if I can submit a receipt for a specific expense in $, they will reimburse that $.
I err on the side of caution. It's not worth being fired over $15.
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Old Apr 8, 2019, 9:51 pm
  #53  
 
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Originally Posted by hipquest
I would like opinions on this issue in regards to cc "freebies". When my husband is on a business trip and uses his PAMEX for inflight wifi we get a statement credit that is automatic BUT it takes away from what we would use for personal travel. I always make sure he submits it as an expense since he is actually using it for work email. FWIW, he can go through this credit in January before we actually to get to any personal travel. How do/would you handle this?
Statement credits are the best way of keeping your side of the arrangement away from your employers eyes. E.g. if your employer offers to pay for Global Entry, you can go ahead and buy it. You can submit a receipt for it and prove you obtained it. Same for wifi passes if reimbursed as a statement credit.
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Old Apr 8, 2019, 10:20 pm
  #54  
 
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Originally Posted by FlyingHighlander
Statement credits are the best way of keeping your side of the arrangement away from your employers eyes. E.g. if your employer offers to pay for Global Entry, you can go ahead and buy it. You can submit a receipt for it and prove you obtained it. Same for wifi passes if reimbursed as a statement credit.
Interesting, I don't think that would have occurred to me since I would have chosen to get a card that offers a GE credit whether or not my employer also pays for it. If my company required me to make all purchases on a corporate card, then yeah I'd be happy to stick them with the bill.
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Old Apr 9, 2019, 5:24 am
  #55  
 
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Originally Posted by MSPeconomist
I've been told that government fares have a contract provision which essentailly says that the traveler cannot be IDBed


This is not true, though so many of them book into Y or other high fare buckets that IDBs essentially never happened even before the Dr. Dao incident.

Originally Posted by MSPeconomist
normal government rules (which very somewhat by agency) seem to permit taking a VDB on the way home if it's during your time off from work, but not when you're on your way to something and not if you're on the clock.
You can take a VDB in either direction and keep the compensation, so long as it doesn't interfere with your work, you do it on your own time and don't charge any additional expenses to the taxpayers.

https://www.gsa.gov/policy-regulatio...22660#i1205031

I used to do these all the time because my usual route to a temporary project included an E120 LAX-SAN leg that was always overweight and often oversold. The "correct" flight got me in after the workday was over anyway, so it hurt no one for me to show up to my hotel room 2-3 hours later--either way, I was at work on time the next morning.
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Old Apr 9, 2019, 5:29 am
  #56  
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Originally Posted by FlyingHighlander
Statement credits are the best way of keeping your side of the arrangement away from your employers eyes. E.g. if your employer offers to pay for Global Entry, you can go ahead and buy it. You can submit a receipt for it and prove you obtained it. Same for wifi passes if reimbursed as a statement credit.
If you hate your employer and your job so much that you would risk it over a $100 statement credit, I would put my efforts into buffing up the resume and then shipping it off to my head hunter.
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Old Apr 9, 2019, 6:37 am
  #57  
 
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Originally Posted by FlyingHighlander
My corporate Amex is not on my credit report at all. Are you saying if I missed a payment it wouldn't suddenly show up?
I can't speak for your company, but, typically, Amex corporate cardholders are jointly liable (with their employer) for the balances on their accounts.
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Old Apr 9, 2019, 6:41 am
  #58  
 
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Originally Posted by hipquest
I would like opinions on this issue in regards to cc "freebies". When my husband is on a business trip and uses his PAMEX for inflight wifi we get a statement credit that is automatic BUT it takes away from what we would use for personal travel. I always make sure he submits it as an expense since he is actually using it for work email. FWIW, he can go through this credit in January before we actually to get to any personal travel. How do/would you handle this?
In this case, I'd expense it, since you're using up a personal resource. If the card offered unlimited free WiFi passes, then I wouldn't expense it, since it's not costing you anything.

The simplest solution in this case might be to pay for that business use wifi with a different card, and save the credits for your personal use.

Last edited by cestmoi123; Apr 10, 2019 at 5:03 am
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Old Apr 9, 2019, 6:57 am
  #59  
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Originally Posted by Often1
If you hate your employer and your job so much that you would risk it over a $100 statement credit, I would put my efforts into buffing up the resume and then shipping it off to my head hunter.
If your employer is such a miserable skinflint that it would lay claim to a refund awarded to an employee for an inconvenience they suffered and complained about then that is an employer not worth working for in the first place. Were that the reason cited for termination the resulting wrongful dismissal suit would not go well for the employer.
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Old Apr 9, 2019, 7:36 am
  #60  
 
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Originally Posted by davie355
Say you’re in a hotel for work, paying with your personal credit card. You check out and receive a PDF folio by email. You take the hotel’s post-stay survey and express disappointment with some aspect of the hotel. The hotel contacts you a day later and refunds a partial amount, as a goodwill gesture, to your credit card.

When it comes to reimbursement from your client or employer, do you expense the original amount or the reduced amount that you actually ended up paying?
Funny that you call it an "ethics question". By asking the question, you indicate that you already know that this action would be wrong. If you find justification in these paragraphs, good for you. And not so good for the rest of us.

Interesting how many here have equated getting punished with doing wrong. If you don't get punished, it isn't wrong. When driving, I speed all the time. Even when stopped, I am rarely ticketed. Does that make all my speeding legal?
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