Tips on Reviewing Expense Reports

Although you would want to look at every expense carefully, sometimes you may miss out on a few of them. These expenses can be out of policy claims, resulting in a huge loss to the company when summed up. Accountants should review each expense report to make sure that the expenses claimed for reimbursement are in line with the company’s policy. Hence, you need to review all expense claims thoroughly to avoid any sort of damages. The following are a few tips that tell how to review receipts carefully:

Reviewing expenses with receipts

• Sort the receipts in the order listed in the expense report. Figure out expense items that don’t have receipts

• Review the first receipt to make sure it is legitimate and not questionable. All expenses claimed for reimbursement should have supportive and valid receipts with attached bills.

• Review all the receipts to make sure that all expense claims abide by the company’s policy guidelines.

• Tally the receipt with the line item in the expense report to ensure that all the details such as amount, date, and description are entered correctly.

• Find out whether the expenses are approved by the management

• If the expense falls within the defined guidelines, assign a general ledger expense account to the expense line item to take it forward to accounts payable process

• Repeat the same process for each expense line item mentioned in the expense report

• Check with employees in case of improper documentation or out-of-policy expenses

• Sum up all the expenses and check whether expenses incurred are on par with the anticipated. Figure out areas where it costs you more.

Mileage review

• Review all the locations your employee visited to find out if there is a legitimate purpose to visit.

• Select few mileage locations randomly and check the mileage accuracy using internet mapping software such as MapQuest.

• Get in touch with some customers to make sure your employee has really made sales calls

• Compare the per diem rates mentioned in the report with the per diem rate issued by the Internal Revenue Service

Adopting these methods while reviewing expense reports would ensure policy compliance and make your reimbursement process faster. Also, having technology like expense report software at the workplace will help you a lot in reviewing expenses.