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Comment by chasingthewind | Hacker News Reader

I have done a tiny amount of business travel in my career but recently went to a conference in a far off land and had to wrestle with the expensing system. First, I was required to loan my employer $3000 for a month by paying for all the expenses (including the unavoidable very expensive hotel rate) on my personal card. Afterwards I had to fight with the expensing system for several hours to get everything lined up correctly so that I could have the privilege of having my own money returned. I was scrupulously honest with my expenses and still felt like I was being eyed suspiciously by the system.

I never once considered misrepresenting my expenses but I definitely considered pounding my keyboard. :)

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> First, I was required to loan my employer $3000 for a month by paying for all the expenses (including the unavoidable very expensive hotel rate) on my personal card.

This is the part that kills me. In my org people frequently travel at the last minute to Asia for weeks at a time. Those claims sometimes end up into the five figure range depending on the time of year. People have been almost stranded because they've maxed out their personal cards.

Credit Cards, like American Express, allow you to bundle current expenses to the end of the next month. If you manage correctly, you can get reimbursed for your expenses about 10-20 days before Amex bill you for that period.

So, if you end-up lending $3000 of your own money to your employer, you are doing it wrong.

I think using an employer-provided card is superior for a lot of reasons, but spending 5 figures on a personal card and being reimbursed for it doesn't sound bad as someone with an extremely high credit limit and rewards cards that give 2-3% back on most purchases. I know some people who manage to fly first class to some pretty far-flung destinations using points they got from company spending on their personal credit cards.

That being said it can be pretty risky if your accounting department loses a check

I use personal cards by choice but I absolutely understand someone who doesn't want to commingle thousands of dollars of company expenses with their own accounts. I would hope that most businesses offer the option of a corporate card to any employees who rack up significant reimbursable expenses.

I frequently say that the only thing I hate more than doing my expenses is not having my money. :-) (I travel a lot so the amounts add up quickly.)

I know I'm hopelessly naive but I'm surprised there isn't An App for that™

Instead of filing expenses when you get back home/a month later, you whip out the app while still travelling, take a picture of the receipts/invoice, and then filling in a short form. The app posts the item to the trip (along with photographic evidence) and that's one less thing to do upon your return.

That would be very convenient for the employee, but it's probably more profitable to sell management on an AI based machine learning automatic fraud detection system that practically pays for itself!!!

There is. Concur is one that's commonly used. You're right of course that if you keep up with things as you go along it's much easier. Some of us aren't always disciplined like that :-) and, in practice, I usually don't want to fuss around with taking pictures of receipts in the restaurant.

For more complicated trips, it's not always completely straightforward though. It's not uncommon for me to mix some pleasure with business so it's often not as simple as just expensing everything.

Expensify

Company credit cards are brilliant for this - you still have to do the expense claims but at least you are never out of pocket.

Although you don't get the perks from the credit card then :-)

You do if you own the company.

Are benefits from a company credit card taxable?

On the other hand, getting 2% back on that $3000 because you used your own card is a nice perk.

the $3000 on your own card is actually a perk for some people as it allows you to get credit card points

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