Business travel is essential to growing your business—whether for building your network, or having a face-to-face meeting with that dream client, a work trip can mean the difference between a good year and a great one.

1. Building an Effective Corporate Travel Policy
September 11, 2018

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Featured Speaker
Ernie Humphrey
Chief Executive Officer
360 Thought Leadership Consulting
360 Thought Leadership Consulting helps companies
define and unlock the strategic value of their thought
leadership programs. Formerly, Ernie served as Vice
President, Educational Programs for Proformative, as
the Director of Treasury Services and as a Director of
the Corporate Treasurers Council for the Association
for Financial Professionals.

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Webinar Notes
• Today’s event will be recorded and all attendees will be kept in listen-
only mode to eliminate excessive background noise.
• Links to today’s presentation and the recording of this webinar will be
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up with you directly.

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About Certify
• Integrated, automated solutions for travel, expense, and
accounts payable invoice
• 64 languages, 140+ currencies, clients in 80 countries
• #1 highest rated expense management software for user
satisfaction on G2 Crowd
• PC Magazine Editors’ Choice for best expense
management software of 2017
• Processing expenses and receipts valued at nearly $10+
billion annually

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Learning Objectives
• Learn the essential elements of an effective corporate travel policy
• Analyze your company’s current travel practices to inform guidelines
• Discover best practices for budgeting, and negotiating special rates
• Consider recommendations and expensed-related laws in your policy creation
• Learn ways to drive compliance across the organization

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Polling Question 1
Do you have a written travel policy at your company?
a) Yes
b) No
c) Not sure

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Essential Elements of a Corporate Travel Policy
An effective corporate travel policy…
...is clear and simple to follow for all employees
...is up-to-date with rules, partners, and discounts
...manages the average traveler within the organization
...allows for reasonable accommodations
...contains clear explanations for limits and restrictions
...considers travel vendors with discounts and preferred pricing
...enforces legal compliance with IRS standards and other regulations

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Current Travel Policies
Questions to Ask
• How is travel currently booked? (air, hotel, car rental)
• What is the process for employee reimbursement?
• Who is responsible for booking travel?
• On average, how many days in advance is travel booked?
• What is the average cost of booked travel? (Include: hotel, airfare, car rental, meals)
• What is the general level of travel being booked? (Business class airfare, 3 star hotels, upgraded car rentals, etc.)
• Who is overseeing and approving booked travel?
• On average, how many employees are being booked for each trip?

9. PRO TIP: KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE
Crafting a policy without the input of team members and key
stakeholders can result in lower policy compliance and unhappy
travelers. An agreeable policy that can meet some of the needs and
expectations of the employee is important.

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Identify Goals of Your Organization
Establish priorities and goals for your travel policy, including:
• Improve the safety of employees
• Reduce travel and accommodation expenses
• Clearly outline what the company will reimburse (and won’t)
• Help expedite the reimbursement process
• Help ensure legal and IRS compliance
• Reduce risk for the company and employees

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Polling Question 2
What was the reason for your most recent business trip?
a) Client meeting
b) Networking/event
c) Training/education
d) Prospecting

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Determining a Budget
Review prior travel spend
• What has been spent on travel in the past several years?
• Is spending up or down?
• Is there a change in the number of travelers or amount of trips each year?
Review prior travel spend
• Identify the most common reason and locations for travel.
• What airlines and hotels are booked most frequently?
• Who in the organization is traveling the most?
Identify trends in category spending
• Review expense category averages to see average spend outside of hotels and airfare.
• Meals, snacks, transportation, and any additional expenses relating to travel.

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Determining a Budget, cont’d
Talk to the team about past and upcoming travel
• Ask employees who are traveling the most about trip length, hotel stays, airfare, etc.
• How many people travel together?
• Are there client meetings, conference registration fees?
Adjust your travel budget as needed
• Check in quarterly or monthly to se how travel expenses are tracking against your budget.
Consider using outside sources to inform your budget development process
• General Services Administration (GSA) per diem rate benchmarks
• Travel-focused research organizations like U.S. Travel Association or GBTA
• Certify’s quarterly SpendSmart™ Report for business travel spending data

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How Companies Set T&E Spending Limits
We do not have expense
category spending limits
Budget based on
company historical
spending
Follow U.S. GSA per diem
rate guidelines
Determined by annual
budgeting process
Other
2018 Expense Management Trends Report, Certify, Inc.

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Policy Introduction: Make Recommendations and Set Expectations
Example Policy Introduction
This policy is intended to outline the travel guidelines and expense reporting requirements for [Company Name]
business travelers and employee-initiated expenses. All employees must adhere to the limitations presented
within this document and it is the responsibility of managers to carefully review and approve all compliant
expenses. Any expenses that fall outside of the guidelines set forth by this policy should be reconciled by the
manager and employee before submitting the expense report to accounting.
While this policy is built with best practices for business travelers within [Company Name] and is meant to be
comprehensive, the realities of travel and expenses may conflict with the policy. It is upon the employee to seek
out travel bookings that best align with the policy while meeting reasonable expectations for travel and
accommodations.

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Responsibility, Authorization, and Permissions
• Remind travelers that before booking any travel, it must be approved and authorized
by the required personnel.
• Define approval and permission paths clearly and succinctly.
• Minimize the number of authorizations: the more approvals a travel request needs,
the longer it will sit unfulfilled.
• Adopt a streamlined process so travelers will seek out the proper authorization, but
stay within and adhere to the policy

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The Business Traveler Approval Process
Consider implementing a process like this one to minimize the number of travel
requests and approvals:
Traveler is responsible for:
• Booking travel arrangements
(themselves, via an agent, etc.)
and documenting all the
expenses that are part of
the trip
• Filling out expense reports that
include all travel expenses and
ensuring each is within policy
Manager is responsible for:
• Approving any expenses that are
associated with the trip
• Assessing what is covered under
the policy and disqualifying the
non-compliant expenses
Accountant is responsible for:
• Reconciling and reimbursing
expense reports for travelers
• Acting as the last gate for
approvals, and double checking
expenses to make sure they are
covered under the policy

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Duty of Care and Other Obligations
Many countries have adopted legislation that defines an employer’s duty to ensure a
basic means to protect employees. Along with IRS requirements (for example,
documents and receipts are stored for the recommended three years), here are
examples of expense-related laws that may apply to your company:
Physician Payments Sunshine Act (PPSA)
Requires medical product manufacturers to disclose any payments to physicians or teaching hospitals.
Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX)
Requires the reporting and verification of all financial statements to prevent accounting fraud within publicly held
businesses.

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Common Policy Exceptions
Executives – Many companies opt to provide policy exceptions for executive travel or
implement an executive-level travel policy that has more expansive travel options.
Long Trips – For travelers taking longer than average trips, some companies allow for
upgraded air travel as well as higher-level accommodations than the policy
typically allows.
Seasoned Travelers – For employees who are constantly on the road, some are given
an enhanced policy that allows for higher-level travel options.

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Expense Reporting and Reimbursement
What documentation is needed so that the company may reimburse the employee?
Receipts for all expenses
Forms to document attendees at client meals
When are travelers required to turn in expense reports following a trip?
Enforce a deadline for expense report submittal, i.e. travelers must submit expense
reports within two weeks of the conclusion of their trip

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Non-Reimbursable Expenses
Items most companies will not reimburse:
• Fees (parking tickets, change fees, seat/car upgrades)
• Personal (dry cleaning/laundry, souvenirs, toiletries, clothing)
• Gratuity (hotel staff tips)
• Boarding (childcare, pets)
• Non-employees (any costs related to non-employee travelers)
• Combined travel (any personal costs incurred after travel period)

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Reimbursable Expenses
The most common reimbursable expenses:
• Travel (airfare, rail fare)
• Lodging (hotel)
• Transportation (taxi, Uber/Lyft, subway, bus)
• Personal transportation (car rental, personal car/mileage)
• Meals (with and without attendees, snacks, etc.)
• Business expenses (conference registration fees, presentation materials)
• Client expenses (meals, entertainment)

23. PRO TIP: SET EXPECTATIONS
Since policies differ from company to company, many travelers may
be unsure about what is reimbursable while they’re on the road. It’s
important to clearly define what the company will reimburse as well
as what is not covered under the policy.

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Forge Partnerships & Identify Discounts
• When forming relationships with vendors, remember that these companies want
your business and are actively seeking corporate accounts that are likely to provide
continued revenue.
• Utilize past travel data to demonstrate the volume of travel your organization needs
each year and negotiate better deals for your company.
• For hotel and airline negotiations, seek out bids from providers that have properties
and routes that provide service to your key travel spots.

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Polling Question 4
Do you have special rates negotiated with vendors?
a) Yes
b) No
c) Not sure

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Integrated Travel Booking: Pre-Trip Approval
• Requires manager authorization prior to any booking
• Configure to meet policy guidelines (Does every itinerary need approval, or just
bookings that deviate from policy?)
• Keeps spending in check for last-minute trips or frequent exceptions
• Ensure the approver is available to process airfare ticket requests

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Polling Question 3
How do you handle travel bookings at your company?
a) Online travel sites
b) Corporate travel department
c) A travel agency
d) A combination of the above

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Driving T&E Policy Compliance
• Educate business travelers & all managers who approve T&E expenses
• Review your T&E policy with all employees at least annually
• Deliver easy access to your T&E policy
• Deliver easy access to T&E policy FAQs
• Develop a culture of accountability

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Driving T&E Policy Compliance
Incentives to Drive Policy Compliance:
• Monetary – reward employees for saving company money
• Point systems – gamify policy compliance
• Contests – incentivize and motivate teams
• Penalties – use minimally to avoid negative morale effects

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10 Travel Policy Best Practices
1. Define travel parameters that are aligned with the company’s corporate culture and
budgetary goals, but flexible enough to account for travel in response to business
dynamics.
2. Meet all the rules that define an Accountable Plan as defined by the IRS. This covers
everything from expenses and reimbursements, rules for independent contractors,
how to report travel, entertainment, gift and car expenses, etc.
3. Automate policy enforcement with clearly defined spending limits and automatic
notification of policy violations to ensure compliance.
4. Institute a clear and transparent approval process including the timing of when
approval decisions need to be made and the turnaround times for expense
reimbursement.
5. Specify how travel is to be booked.

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10 Travel Policy Best Practices
6. Establish how payments are to be made to be eligible for reimbursement.
7. Audit with purpose, be it budget management, fraud/loss protection or auditing to
test specific controls and processes.
8. Outline conditions under which any exceptions can occur and create a clear audit trail
for any exceptions granted to travelers.
9. Integrate travel expense processing to facilitate compliance and create efficiencies by
streamlining processes.
10. Benchmark key areas of spend and require a review of policy if benchmarks are
exceeded by a target percentage.

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In Review: Things to Consider
• Establish priorities and goals for your travel policy, i.e. improve safety of business
travelers, expedite the reimbursement process, and reduce risk
• Use past travel data to inform your budget and negotiate with vendors
• Consider creating policy exceptions for executives or frequent travelers
• Ensure compliance with applicable expense-related laws
• Invest in tools to assist with pre-trip approvals to stop policy violations before
they happen

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Questions and Answers
Q&A

34. Thank you!