Review some of the most common questions regarding Concur Requests and Expense Reports as they relate to travel and entertainment policies.
For frequently asked questions regarding pre-trip activity and paying for travel and entertainment expenses, see:
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Yes, employee payees/travelers/hosts must first add delegates in Concur and select permissions to allow delegates to prepare Concur Requests and/or Expense Reports on their behalf.
Note: Travelers/Cardholders must still certify the accuracy of their expenses by reviewing expense information and clicking on the Submit Report button in the Concur document.
If you haven’t already, we recommend that you download the Concur Mobile App onto any of your mobile devices. You can easily snap a photo of your receipts and upload them to the Concur Mobile App
You can also easily turn your receipt images into expense entries with the mobile app and add them to your expense report.
No, UCPath employee information is imported into Concur so all active employees can simply log in and start the reimbursement process.
It is advised that you enter your chart string information before taking any other steps. Go to your Profile > Profile Settings > Expense Information > then enter your accounting string.
Confer with your fund manager or Financial Unit Approver for assistance with your chartstring (COA/POETAF) information.
Note: Non-employee payees for events/travel will still need to be registered via PaymentWorks
You can got to the Business Analytics Hub and click on Budget and Finance. From there you will locate the Procure-to-Pay Panorama and select it. To look up the status of a supplier/traveler, click on Supplier Inquiry and then you can search by your preferred parameter (e.g. Supplier, Supplier Type, etc). Once you look up the Supplier, you will know if they're Active or Inactive based on the information the Supplier Profile Status column in the report.
An Expense Type is strictly a Concur term required to categorize the expenses being claimed on a Concur document. Each Concur Expense Type is associated with a particular Account segment (i.e. Account Code) from UCSD’s accounting string.
An Expenditure Type also specifies the type of expense but on a more granular level. It is one accounting segment of the POET information required for Projects in the Oracle Project Portfolio Management (PPM) module.
For more information, visit the Blink page that defines both terms and provides further information on the Concur Expense Types and how they relate to accounting and sales/use tax.
However, if you inadvertently paid for the virtual conference registration out-of-pocket or with your Travel & Entertainment (T&E) Card, there is guidance on how to reconcile the expense. If there are no travel expenses, then you may submit an Events & Other Reimbursements Expense Report. For employee reimbursement, select Non-Event from the Business Purpose Type form field. If you used your T&E Card, select the Business/Technical Meeting as the Event Business Purpose Type. Then add the Seminar/Conference Registration Expense Type.
Before the trip, travelers (Concur users) or travel preparers (Concur delegates) must create a Travel Request in Concur to preauthorize the trip.
After the trip occurs, travelers or their delegates will reconcile and claim expenses on a Travel Expense Report, linked to the respective Travel Request, through Concur.
Yes, you have the ability to request Guest and Group Travel within Concur. You would indicate the Traveler Type in the Request/Report Header of the Concur document.
For Guest Travel, selecting Traveler Type: Non-Employee (Guest), selecting Payment Type: Payment to Non-Employee, and completing the Payee Non-Employee Name & Remittance Address fields will indicate payment to a non-employee Guest Traveler.
For Group Travel, you would create the expense report under the employee Group Leader’s Concur user account and select Traveler Type: Group. The Expense Types specific to Group Travel expenses are Hotel Group and Group Meals & Incidentals .
Note: Guest Travel bookings are to be managed through Concur Travel.
Supporting documentation and receipts are required for the following travel expenses:
An approved Travel Request can be associated with multiple Expense Reports. You can create additional Expense Reports as amendment trips tied to the original Travel Request.
Best practice is to place all expenses related to the same trip on one expense report. However, if you have prepayments on an Expense Report submitted prior to final reconciliation, then you would need to claim the University Prepaid amount on the final Travel Expense Report.
If travel dates are changed or extended for any non-business reason, or if travel is extended to include personal travel, the traveler may only be reimbursed for expenses incurred within the business travel dates. If airfare is involved, a comparable airfare (airfare that follows the business travel dates) must be found at time of booking. The traveler is eligible to receive reimbursement for whichever amount is lower.
Example: Traveler is going to a conference from 1/11 and returning on 1/14, but would like to stay until 1/17 as personal travel. When booking the airfare from 1/11-1/17, a comparable quote must be found for 1/11-1/14 (as if the traveler did not take personal travel). The lesser amount between the actual expenses and the comparable is reimbursable.
This also applies if the traveler travels to a different place for personal reasons before returning to San Diego (or the origin of their trip).
Example: Traveler travels from San Diego on 1/11 to Dallas for a conference. After the conference, the traveler flies to Denver on 1/14 for personal travel. They then fly from Denver to San Diego on 1/17. When booking the airfare, a comparable quote must be found for a flight from San Diego - Dallas on 1/11 and Dallas - San Diego on 1/14 (as if the traveler did not take personal travel). The lesser amount between the actual expenses and the comparable is reimbursable.
If there is a valid business purpose to extend the travel or to travel to a different location before returning to the origin of the trip, then the actual expenses are reimbursable. Ensure that the business purpose is clearly stated and additional backup documentation is included when claiming expenses.
Example: Traveler travels from San Diego to Dallas for a conference. After the conference, the traveler flies to Salt Lake City to meet with a key collaboration partner before returning to San Diego. No comparison airfare is needed and actual expenses are reimbursable.
Meeting/event hosts (Concur users) or preparers (Concur delegates) should obtain a Travel & Entertainment Card to pay for business meal and entertainment expenses. However, if employees incurred out-of-pocket expenses, then you would also claim those event expenses via Concur.
After the event occurs, event hosts or their delegates will submit an Event Expense Report through Concur.
For general meal expenses (food and non-alcoholic beverages), use the Food - Dine In, Delivery, Pickup Expense Type. In instances such as the host/meeting coordinator buying food at a store or paying for the business meal at a restaurant, the host would have paid for the sales tax and thus claim the full amount (including tax and tip) for reimbursement.
For catering events, use the Expense Type: Prepared Food/Catering Srvc On-Campus for the total amount of expenses on the invoice that is taxable. This Expense Type is tied to a taxable account code to ensure that proper sales/use tax is applied for catering invoices.
The Event Expense Types Blink page offers a list of all Concur Expense Type categories as well as their associated Account values, their taxability and examples of when to use each one. Use this page as a guide when deciding which Expense Type to use.
Per Regents Policy 5402, all full-service catering performed on-campus must be performed by UC San Diego Catering.
In the event UC San Diego Catering cannot perform the services, you must receive approval from Labor Relations before hiring an outside catering company to perform service. You would create a Catering Event Request in Concur to route for Labor Relations approval. Then once approved and the event has occurred, you would submit an Event Expense Report to process payment. Catering invoices should be paid with the Travel & Entertainment (T&E) Card. Don’t have a T&E Card? Take a look at the Knowledge Base Article on how to request the University card.
For more information, review the Catering & Bar Services Blink page.
Generally, event payments should occur after the event occurs to ensure policy compliance and that the food is as negotiated.
However, should the event/hotel supplier require a deposit for your event, deposits are not to exceed 50% of total event costs. Also, deposits and/or final payments should be paid with the Travel & Entertainment (T&E) Card. Don’t have a T&E Card? Take a look at the Knowledge Base Article on how to request the University card.
The option, T/E Supplier, should only be used when making direct payments to the event supplier. This identifies that there is a prepayment, such as a hotel deposit, as opposed to payments made by the host/User.
When the User pays with their Travel & Entertainment (T&E) Card, the proper Payee Type on the header is Employee. The system will indicate when the payment method is the T&E Card on the expense entry level.
The levels of approvals for events include:
The first level in the workflow is Financial Unit Approval (i.e., the department fund/fiscal manager). Financial Unit Approvers review all Concur documents.
Additional review and approval is required by the Department Head for standard entertainment, or standard business entertainment expenses. Meetings and events that are social in nature; e.g. meeting held off-campus, an event where alcohol was provided, an event with non-UCSD guests in attendance.
The highest level of department approval would be Special Entertainment Approval. Special Entertainment Approval is required for certain entertainment expenses. The nature of the event typically falls under the Concur Business Purpose Types: Employee Morale Building (ex: employee holiday party) & Fundraising/Tickets (ex: Purchase of table/tickets for local activities). Additionally, Special Entertainment Approval is also required when the Cost Per Person exceeds the maximum allowable amount for the meal type and/or when a spouse/partner/relative is in attendance.
If the cost per person exceeds the allowed per-person maximum by 200% or more, the workflow will include Exceptional Approval which is the individual who follows appropriate hierarchy for Chancellor designee approval.
For more information on entertainment approvers, review approving meetings and entertainment.
Concur commitments are created when a Travel Request or Event Request with a Project value is approved in Concur. The commitment will appear in the Costs module the day after the Request is fully approved.
Review the How to Lift Concur Travel or Event Request Commitments KBA for further instruction on lifting an external Concur commitment.
Allocate is a Concur function where employees can split costs across accounting distributions, or distribute expenses to different chartstrings, within the same expense report.
In a single Expense Report, each expense will be charged to the Chart of Accounts (COA) information on the Report Header unless you need to distribute any of the expenses to a different COA. Then you can use the Allocate function in the Expense Details page. This feature would be helpful to avoid having to claim related business expenses on separate Expense Reports or doing a cost transfer. Take a look at How to Allocate Expenses in Concur.
Google Chrome’s Autofill feature might interfere with entering your chart string information in Concur. The Autofill feature will display values to facilitate data entry, but these selections do not transfer to Concur.
After clicking into the form field, the auto-fill will clear after you start typing in the chart string value when creating a Request, Expense Report, or Allocation.
To turn off Google Chrome's Autofill feature: