COA Solutions - Business Accounting Software

Having famously been described by our Managing Director as “cheap to keep”, I thought that I was beyond question when it came to the subject of expenses. No claims for swimming pool maintenance or eyeliners here. However, a recent series of events has prompted me to question even my own, rather humble, expectations.
 
The first involved an incident where I considered I was doing the company a favour by travelling across London using my pre-paid Oyster card which significantly lower fares (for example from £2 to £1 on a standard bus journey). Imagine then my horror when I suddenly received a call from our finance team questioning why I was attempted to claim the cost of my £5.50 Oyster travel card (normal price £8) without providing a receipt. As some of you may be aware, Oyster “pay as you go” fares are unreceipted. After a bit of haggling with the administrator it was agreed that I could top up my Oyster card and use the top up as proof of purchase. I know unreceipted expenses can’t be claimed but after 10 years with the company and my best intentions to my peril I had strayed from the policy.
 
Lesson 1 - Policy exists for good and legal reasons. Whilst my valid travel card had been an attempt to save the company money, if everyone was allowed to claim unreceipted expenses where would this end ?
 
The second incident came when, like many occasions in my life, more haste meant less speed. Whilst busily preparing for an event, I had decided to divide and conquer by asking one of my team to pick up some of the team building prizes whilst they were in town getting lunch. I loaned them £20 of my own cash and asked them to bring me back a receipt. Whilst they were out they called me to say they had found the said prize and it was £20. So I completed the rest of my expenses claim (large by my standards that month ) and gratefully took the receipt without question and added it to the pile to be sent with my claim. Two days later, I received another call from the finance team. I was informed that the actual receipt was in fact £19.95 and that my expense claim would be delayed until this was corrected. Again, with a little bit of haggling, the administrator processed the claim for the correct amount and allowed me to re-submit the paperwork the same day.
 
Lesson 2 - Check your claims yourself. If other people have to do it a mistake can look really shameful and dishonest - even if it is 5p ! Frankly, if it is 5p you also look quite cheap.
 
Finally, my colleague and I were recently asked to attend an awards ceremony on behalf of the company. We had both been invited due to our work with the organisers and I was representing the marketing team whilst she was representing our CEO. We met up and attended the awards after which there was a drinks reception for the Leader of the Technology Group who was retiring on that day. I bought a round of drinks consisting of a glass of water, a glass of wine and one pint of beer - hardly champagne charlies and my colleague commented how generous this was. Turning to her I frowned and said, “Well, as it is part of the event I should be able to claim it on expenses.” She seemed horrified. The fact we had been invited at all was, in her perception, a treat, and to then claim for the drinks seemed ungrateful.
 
Lesson 3 - Acceptability is not just in the eyes of the claimer. You will be judged by your public and your peers, as our MP’s are currently discovering to huge embarrassment. To this end I recalled some wise advice given to me by my first boss, “If you wouldn’t spend your own money on it - then don’t spend the company’s “, a policy he applied to outrageous costs and poor value for money in equal measure.
 
Although, we are now said to have reached the bottom of the recession financially, our moral compasses have still to be precisely re-set. Whilst legal claims against employers drop, fraud and petty theft amongst employees is on the rise, curious when so may of us say we are still in fear of our jobs yet are outraged at the MPs expenses scandal.

It’s interesting then to see one organisation using technology, not only to sensitively and efficiently manage its expenses policy, but also to use it as a way to improve its reporting on carbon emissions as The Forestry Commission has precisely done by rolling out an Employee Expenses Management system. Steve Atkins, Systems Manager at The Forestry Commission, has just made a short film about how this pilot is working out – look out for it on our website soon.

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Tags: expenses, expenses management, forestry commission, house of commons, musing

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 13th, 2009 at 10:00 am and is filed under Musings by Claire Carter. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.