Expenses administration and request management

This article helps you, as a platform admin, to get started with:

• Configuring Expenses settings for your business
• Approving and managing expense requests of employees in your organization

Detailed information

This article contains the following information:

• How to request expense reimbursements on behalf of employees
• Understanding expense approval
• How to configure the default pipeline for expense approval
• How to submit expense requests for approval
• How to approve or reject expense requests
• How to configure Expenses based on your business requirements
  • How to set up custom currency exchange rates
  • How to set up expense categories

How to request expense reimbursements on behalf of employees

To request an expense reimbursement on behalf of an employee, do the following:

1. In the upper-right corner of the Expense Requests page, click + New expense request.

   

   Creating a new expense request

2. Enter the following details:

   1. Enter an Expense Request Name.

   2. In Employee, start typing the name of the employee for whom you are creating the request. Then, select the employee from the list.

      

      Selecting the employee for whom you are requesting expense reimbursement

   3. (Optional) Assign the expense request to one or multiple cost centres.

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      Detailed information

      •   step 2-2 in How to create expense requests

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3. For each expense that needs to be reimbursed, add and configure expense items.

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   Detailed information

   •   step 3 in How to create expense requests

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4. At the bottom of the page, click Save.

Sample expense request for an employee's expenses

The expense request is saved in its initial state (Draft). At this stage, if required, you can still revisit and edit the expense request. When you finish making changes, you can submit the request for approval.

Understanding expense approval

In every organization, a customizable pipeline governs the expense request approval process.

The following example illustrates a typical expense approval workflow that can be implemented through the pipeline.

Sample expense request approval pipeline

A typical approval process for expense requests begins with a review by one or multiple approvers. There might also be multiple levels of approval.

As a platform admin, you might be tasked with approving the expense request at any stage of the pipeline.

When the expense request completes all stages of the approval pipeline and is in the Approved state, the reimbursement can be processed through Payroll.

How to configure the default pipeline for expense approval

As a platform admin, you can set up the default pipeline that would govern the expense request approval process in your organization from your business settings. Do the following:

1. In the sidebar, in the Business section, click Settings.

   

   Navigating to your business settings

2. Go to Organisation > Default Pipelines.

3. In Expense reimbursement, select the pipeline you want to configure.

   

   Configuring the expense approval and reimbursement pipeline

Detailed information

•   Step 3 in Tutorial: Customizing the default pipeline for expense reimbursement

How to submit expense requests for approval

To submit an expense request for approval, open (view) it and at the bottom of the Expense items section, click the action button related to submitting it for approval.

Detailed information

•   How to submit expense requests for approval

How to approve or reject expense requests

As an HR admin or approver assigned for first-level approval of expense requests in your organization, you can do one of the following to action expense requests pending for approval:

• Action expense requests from Expenses
• Action expense requests from Tasks

Action expense requests from Expenses

To review and respond to an expense request in Expenses, open (view) it and at the bottom of the Expense items section, click the action button that represents how you want to respond to it.

Responding to a sample expense request

In this example, the Approve and Decline buttons represent the actions that can be performed.

The status of the expense request is updated accordingly.

Detailed information

•   Responding to an expense request from Expenses

Action expense requests from Tasks

As a platform admin, you can review all pending tasks in the organization, including tasks assigned to other employees, from Tasks.

In Tasks, you can even view and action tasks related to expense requests submitted for approval. These tasks are displayed in a tab that has the same name as your expense request approval pipeline.

In the following example, Expenses tasks are in the Expenses tab in Tasks as a pipeline with the same name governs expense reimbursements for the business.

Illustration of how the Tasks tab has the same name as the expense reimbursement pipeline

To review and respond to an expense request in Tasks, do the following:

1. In the tab, find the task related to the expense request. In the Action column, click Respond.

   The expense request's details and expense items are displayed.

2. After reviewing the request, click the action button that represents how you want to respond to it.

Approving documents of employees from Tasks

In this example, the Approve and Decline buttons represent the actions that can be performed.

The status of the expense request is updated accordingly.

Detailed information

•   Responding to an expense request from Tasks

How to configure Expenses based on your business requirements

As a platform admin, you can do the following to customize Expenses for your busines:

• Set up custom currency exchange rates
• Set up the different types of expenses that employees can reimburse

How to set up custom currency exchange rates

The expenses that employees need to reimburse are sometimes not in their default currency, which is based on their work location.

For simplified calculation and management of expense reimbursements, if an expense report has an expense item in a different currency from the employee's default currency, it is automatically converted to the default currency.

By default, the exchange rate for currency conversion is based on the real-time forex rate from the fixer.io platform.

However, as a platform admin, you can configure a custom exchange rate for any currency. You can do this by customizing the Exchange rates for expense reimbursements preference (available in Requests preferences) from your business settings. Do the following:

1. Click + (Exchange reimbursements exchange rate).

   

   Adding a new custom exchange rate

2. Enter the following details:

   Field	Description
   Local Currency	Currency that the amount needs to be converted into
   Foreign Currency	Expense currency
   Exchange Rate	Your custom exchange rate
   Date Active	Date that the custom exchange rate is effective from

   

   Sample custom exchange rate

3. Click Save.

How to set up expense categories

As a platform admin, you can create expense categories to set up the types of expenses that employees in your organization can reimburse. Do the following:

1. In the sidebar, in the Business section, click Settings.

   

   Navigating to your business settings

2. Go to Payroll > Expense Categories.

3. Click + Add Expense Category.

   

   Adding a new expense category

4. Enter a Name and Description for the expense type.

   

   Entering details of a sample expense category

5. Click + Save Expense Category.

The new expense category is added to the list of expense types that employees can select (from the Type field) when adding expense items to expense requests.

Detailed information

•   How can I configure the list of expense types that employees can reimburse?