Work colleagues

[Hawk89]

33 minutes ago, ICTChris said:

I work with a guy who doesn't claim any expenses if he's away for work.  He pays for the flights himself and all the meals.  I'm pretty sure the hotels are paid for by the company (the hotels we stay in in London are insanely expensive) but he says he can't be bothered filling out the forms.  He's a maniac though, he works about 25 hours of unpaid overtime a week.

There is always someone like that, worked with someone similar years ago. It was odd as our director used to encourage us to cover everything (within reason which even included two or three pints with dinner) on the corporate card, he must have thought it was a trap. 

[Wile E Coyote]

4 hours ago, hk blues said:

Count me in on that too.  Saying that, I work from home so the extra 1 minute a day wouldn't be life-changing!

Again,  I'm not against folk stretching things on expenses, it's a game of cat and mouse, but the guys I'm talking about had that element of entitlement to them.  An example - One of the sales guys said he was claiming his company car valeting fee on expenses but, of course,  I wouldn't be justified in doing so because I was an office guy!    

If he out and about and eats lunch in his car I would say that's a legit expense

[GordonD]

1 hour ago, TAFKAM said:

Sat here boggle eyed at folk working for companies with meal expense policies and not taking advantage of it.

My work has silly stuff like newspaper expenses if you're travelling so the only times in the last decade that I've bought a physical newspaper it's been when I'm getting the train to London and can read the grauniad on the company dime. I didn't even really want to read the news but believe me I'm claiming for what I can claim for.

We had some guys doing some incredibly creative pish ripping that forced them to change policy. We get meal expenses if we're away from the office but they hadn't really defined what constituted being away from the office, so a group of imaginative souls at work would come to work in the morning at one office, decide they needed to drop in to see someone or pick something up from another office, swing by over lunch then come back. They'd then use this as an excuse for being out of the office and needing to claim lunch on expense and their lunch expenses looked like this:

Monday: A dozen eggs, 2 pints of milk, loaf of bread, block of butter

Tuesday: A pound of mince, bag of potatoes, litre of olive oil

Wednesday: A chicken, litre of orange juice, bag of lettuce, kilo of carrots

Thursday: A bag of frozen chips, packet of digestive biscuits, box of teabags, jar of coffee

Friday: A pack of pork chops, box of cereal, tub of ice cream

So now there's a whole elaborate system tracking why and where people travel to stop these geniuses fleecing the company for their messages.

 

Sounds like Gazza going to help out at a siege.

[scottsdad]

In my old job, the policy for overnight travel used to be that staff were paid a blanket rate. A few of our guys would go up north in the van and take tents and sleeping bags with them, and take the £70 "hotel allowance". Then someone had the bright idea to change the system that basically supplemented folks income for years. Now they had to pre-book a B&B, and have a receipt, and have managers and finance people check the receipts and so on. This change made it worse.

Edited June 25, 2021 by scottsdad

[hk blues]

37 minutes ago, Wile E Coyote said:

If he out and about and eats lunch in his car I would say that's a legit expense

Huh - I posted about getting a car valeted, not eating lunch.

If you are referring to the previous post, then sure they'd be entitled to claim lunch if they were on the road - I did it pretty much every day.  But, not when they were working from home and at home during lunchtime!  You wouldn't expect to claim lunch when you are in the office, I hope, yet in their weird way of thinking they were entitled to claim lunch as they weren't in the office even though they were at home. 

I haven't got onto the subject of business mileage yet - some will recall the days when company car tax was based on business mileage.   I'll also throw in one guy who genuinely wouldn't accept he had to pay tax on his company car as a benefit-in-kind as he had 2 cars and only used the company one for business (that in itself was highly unlikely as free fuel was provided for company cars so why would you pay for fuel in your personal car when you can get free in the company one?) - this nonsense was escalated right up to head office in the States.  

Again, the issue wasn't so much the ripping the piss as the entitled attitude to it.  

[hk blues]

3 hours ago, TheScarf said:

See, I go the other way and under claim on expenses as I don't want to be hauled in front of (well a Teams video call at the moment of course) my line manager and payroll to itemise my expenses for the month.

I only every need to go somewhere maybe once or twice a month.  Fuel of course, 2 £3.50 meal deals a month? Nah.

I'll be honest, I claimed for everything within reason but I was travelling 4 days a week so it was as easy to claim for a 4 quid sandwich as a 100 quid a night hotel.  Everything I spent that I wouldn't have if I'd been at home/in the office went on.  I suppose I can see why folk who rarely travel wouldn't be arsed claiming for small items as it would be more hassle than it's worth.  My boss was a good C**t in that respect as he never queried the expense reports but I would only give it to him in person (he was in another location) and waited for him to sign it there and then so I suppose he would have felt awkward going through it line by line.  

[Northboy]

3 hours ago, ICTChris said:

I work with a guy who doesn't claim any expenses if he's away for work.  He pays for the flights himself and all the meals.  I'm pretty sure the hotels are paid for by the company (the hotels we stay in in London are insanely expensive) but he says he can't be bothered filling out the forms.  He's a maniac though, he works about 25 hours of unpaid overtime a week.

Why the f@#k would anyone do that?

[hk blues]

3 hours ago, ICTChris said:

I work with a guy who doesn't claim any expenses if he's away for work.  He pays for the flights himself and all the meals.  I'm pretty sure the hotels are paid for by the company (the hotels we stay in in London are insanely expensive) but he says he can't be bothered filling out the forms.  He's a maniac though, he works about 25 hours of unpaid overtime a week.

That is fucking madness.

As I said in another post, from the minute I was in the car on the road to the minute I got home was on expenses.  No ripping the pish though, everything in moderation so a couple of pints in a bog standard Indian restaurant was the norm, no Michelin restaurants and French wine for me.  A meal deal in the motorway services was lunch, no eating in any of those service station restaurants.  I drew the line at sleeping in Travelodges though,  city centre places where possible. 

Downside for me was no company credit card so everything was on mine and the reimbursement would take a few weeks (my fault as I had a system I stuck to) so could easily be a significant amount out of pocket at any given time.  

I'd have hated to work in a company that was stingy on the expenses.  

(Aside, one of the MDs told me a funny story over a few beers.  In his first job as a Salesman he needed a hat (this was in the 60s so hats were the norm I guess) so he bought one and put it on expenses.  His boss went apeshit.  A few years later, the boss was retiring and commented that he was pleased that had never happened again - the MD just smiled and said it had happened a few times but he'd never been able to see it.  Moral of the story, if you're going to buy a hat on expenses, make sure it's down as a Bic Mac meal).

[Northboy]

2 minutes ago, hk blues said:

As I said in another post, from the minute I was in the car on the road to the minute I got home was on expenses.

For me anything away from home is on expenses and, like you, provided there is nothing excessive my boss/company never have any problems.

Some years ago a guy at my work had to fly down to Manchester for the day. He got back to Aberdeen around 7:00pm and went out for a slap up meal at a well known local hostelry which he put through on expenses. In his defence I don't think he'd every travelled for work before and had no idea about expenses protocol. He either plead ignorance or argued his case well as the company ultimately paid up but it was a source of piss taking for years.

[Wile E Coyote]

55 minutes ago, hk blues said:

Huh - I posted about getting a car valeted, not eating lunch.

If you are referring to the previous post, then sure they'd be entitled to claim lunch if they were on the road - I did it pretty much every day.  But, not when they were working from home and at home during lunchtime!  You wouldn't expect to claim lunch when you are in the office, I hope, yet in their weird way of thinking they were entitled to claim lunch as they weren't in the office even though they were at home. 

I haven't got onto the subject of business mileage yet - some will recall the days when company car tax was based on business mileage.   I'll also throw in one guy who genuinely wouldn't accept he had to pay tax on his company car as a benefit-in-kind as he had 2 cars and only used the company one for business (that in itself was highly unlikely as free fuel was provided for company cars so why would you pay for fuel in your personal car when you can get free in the company one?) - this nonsense was escalated right up to head office in the States.  

Again, the issue wasn't so much the ripping the piss as the entitled attitude to it.  

I think you have misunderstood me. I meant if he eats lunch in his car its going to create crumbs and mess so claiming for a car valet is a legit expense IMO

[Left Back]

Some grassing b*****d has been handing CCTV photos to the press of me snogging some bird in the office.

Will be one of those peasants on the security desk.

[Shipa]

28 minutes ago, Wile E Coyote said:

I think you have misunderstood me. I meant if he eats lunch in his car its going to create crumbs and mess so claiming for a car valet is a legit expense IMO

I would agree that it is a legit expense. If you're office based, the company will probably employ a cleaner to clean the office at the company's expense. If the guy is on the road all the time, his car is effectively his office, why shouldn't it also be cleaned at the company's expense.

[GordonD]

Deleted

Edited June 25, 2021 by GordonD

[Turkmenbashi]

4 hours ago, ICTChris said:

Making employers liable for the cost of commuting would be an interesting exercise in unintended consequences.  A lot of employers aren't based in areas that are amenable to public transport.  If my company were to pay for a train pass for me then my commute would be much longer, I'd have to get a bus to the train staation then another bus from the destination to my office.  Considering I'll still need a car then I'd probably rather just drive in, especially if I'm working a couple of days a week.  If I worked in the centre of Edinburgh it'd be different but only maniacs drive into Edinburgh for work.

If you made companies pay or contribute to petrol costs then they'd be vulnerable to rises in the prices.  On the plus side it could be factored into encouraging people to choose more fuel efficient or electric cars and I bet companies would prefer staff to get trains or buses than be liable for fuel costs.  I do think you'd end up with sutations where a lot of companies, particularly smaller ones, would just not recruit people who lived any distance away from their main workplace.  Most of the places I've worked some people have had ridiculous commutes - guys driving into Edinburgh from South Ayrshire or to Inverness from Elgin  I once worked with a guy who lived on the Black Isle but worked in Edinburgh, he'd drive down on Monday morning, stay in a B&B until Thursday and drive back up on Friday.  Doubt the company would've fancied picking up his petrol costs.

A lot of this is predicated on the fact that many offices are out of town or in out of the way places designed for car travel - for example, Livingston.  Perhaps int eh post-pandemic, post retail collapse economy we'll start to see a move back to city centres as companies move towards having staff working from home and maybe touching down in a smaller space a couple of days a week.  To attract the young 'uns you have to have an attractive destination a lot of the time and somewhere in a city centre is a lot more attractive than a giant car park off the M8.

When I worked in Belgium I believe you are supposed to get tax relief or something on your commute into work. This has the consequence of almost everyone getting a company car (or in my case a company bike), with a fuel card, even for jobs where a car is completely unnecessary. Although I believe if your company car is used for non work related purposes this can also have tax consequences. Also everyone gets food vouchers which are supposed to cover any food, eaten during working hours. Because food eaten during work could be claimed back as tax relief or something like that.

[B.K.]

I worked with a guy, late 90's early 000's (he was my equivalent covering the Midlands & Wales)

Twice a month he would claim for staying in a hotel somewhere around the Cardigan Bay area, which was nothing unusual back in the day, as that was all our normal work patterns, staying out 2 nights a week, every week.

Problem arose when a new boss started in the accounts department in the groups head office in Swindon and just happened to notice his expenses one month and took it upon himself to check his previous claims.

Home printed hand written receipts or as was the rumour at the time that he had nicked a book of receipts from one of his official stays there, none the less ...... silly b*****d hadn't realised that the new boss man was originally from that said town in Wales, what a coincidence there, and enlightened everyone that the hotel he had claimed to be staying in for all these months had in fact burnt down and been condemned the previous January, some 16 months earlier.

Like I said silly bugger, but not a well liked guy, so no tears shed !!

Dilemma he was offered by the big wigs was, pay back the missing £000's immediately and sack yourself OR lets see what the police have to say (& still pay it back) !!

LESSON TO BE LEARNED HERE.

 

 

 

 

 

[scottsdad]

A week today, and I'll be posting my pish and Star Trek pictures to P&B from my office.

[Miguel Sanchez]

6 hours ago, ICTChris said:

Making employers liable for the cost of commuting would be an interesting exercise in unintended consequences.  A lot of employers aren't based in areas that are amenable to public transport.  If my company were to pay for a train pass for me then my commute would be much longer, I'd have to get a bus to the train staation then another bus from the destination to my office.  Considering I'll still need a car then I'd probably rather just drive in, especially if I'm working a couple of days a week.  If I worked in the centre of Edinburgh it'd be different but only maniacs drive into Edinburgh for work.

If you made companies pay or contribute to petrol costs then they'd be vulnerable to rises in the prices.  On the plus side it could be factored into encouraging people to choose more fuel efficient or electric cars and I bet companies would prefer staff to get trains or buses than be liable for fuel costs.  I do think you'd end up with sutations where a lot of companies, particularly smaller ones, would just not recruit people who lived any distance away from their main workplace.  Most of the places I've worked some people have had ridiculous commutes - guys driving into Edinburgh from South Ayrshire or to Inverness from Elgin  I once worked with a guy who lived on the Black Isle but worked in Edinburgh, he'd drive down on Monday morning, stay in a B&B until Thursday and drive back up on Friday.  Doubt the company would've fancied picking up his petrol costs.

A lot of this is predicated on the fact that many offices are out of town or in out of the way places designed for car travel - for example, Livingston.  Perhaps int eh post-pandemic, post retail collapse economy we'll start to see a move back to city centres as companies move towards having staff working from home and maybe touching down in a smaller space a couple of days a week.  To attract the young 'uns you have to have an attractive destination a lot of the time and somewhere in a city centre is a lot more attractive than a giant car park off the M8.

You're better than this, Chris.

[Lex]

We get a £30 use it or lose it meal/drink allowance if we are away for a night.
Couple of years ago I arrived at the hotel late after the kitchen was closed and the bar was calling last orders.
Ordered two pints and about £25 of crisps and soft drinks for the drive home. Was tough to make sure that £30 was maxed to the penny as usual, but I managed it.

[WeAreElgin]

Dozy c***s that say shit like "the expenses limit is a limit and not a target" were my favourite. Spewing c***s having to approve my £29.85 evening meal which clearly shows a £4.85 meal and £25 of pints on the receipt. I guess those days are probably over. [emoji22]

[JamesP_81]

24 minutes ago, Lex said:

We get a £30 use it or lose it meal/drink allowance if we are away for a night.
Couple of years ago I arrived at the hotel late after the kitchen was closed and the bar was calling last orders.
Ordered two pints and about £25 of crisps and soft drinks for the drive home. Was tough to make sure that £30 was maxed to the penny as usual, but I managed it.

Haha that's the same with my work , £30 limit so dinner is never just what do I want to eat but what can I get off the menu for exactly £30 . Like you say its use it or lose it so these people who don't claim or try to keep their claim as low as possible are missing the point.  At best it's highly unlikely that anyone is going to give a toss that these warriors are saving the company a tenner here and 20 quid there , at worse it could highlight that they're able to work away without claiming so why can't their colleagues .