Advance payment of professional expenses consists in defining, either on a one-off or permanent basis, a lump sum to cover expenses incurred by an employee in the performance of a mission, such as travel, accommodation or catering costs. This avoids the need for employees who travel frequently to personally advance funds, especially when the costs are disproportionate to the salary. However, employers are under no legal obligation to advance the costs. On the other hand, they are obliged to reimburse them a posteriori on presentation of receipts, known as expense claims.
Receiving an advance on expenses isn't all good news. If your employer seems reluctant to change his method, here are 4 arguments you could use to convince him to stop and do away with expense advances.
A waste of time for the company
It takes time to process an expense claim, or to evaluate the budget required for the travel of several employees.
In the case of a one-off advance, the amount given to the employee must be calculated as precisely as possible, which is particularly difficult to do when the missions are different each time. Next, the employee must provide expense statements, which must be checked, booked and filed. If the budget has been exceeded, an additional reimbursement operation is required. If, on the other hand, the employee has not spent everything, the accounting department will deduct the difference from his next salary.
An additional cost for the company
The administrative and accounting staff responsible for handling advances and expense claims spend many hours on these tasks, which means they are not spending their working time on higher value-added tasks.
Risk of error
A typing error when copying an expense claim, loss of a receipt, an expense wrongly recorded as professional, incorrect VAT deductibility... human error can happen very quickly, not to mention non-compliant or incomplete documents supplied by service providers.
The risk for the company is a tax reassessment, the consequences of which are always damaging. Urssaf keeps a close eye on abuses in this area.
Complicated accounting
Even if managing planned expense advances is simpler for the accountant than reimbursing expenses on an ad hoc basis, accounting is still complicated.
Additional reimbursements, recovery of overpayments, adjustments to pay slips, manual recording of expense claims... If your company has a large number of mobile employees, managing expense advances can quickly become a heavy burden for the accounting department.
How can I avoid having to pay in advance?
To avoid having to manage expense accounts and advances, the company can use professional bank cards, known as company, business or corporate cards, depending on the establishment. There are also fuel cards for these specific expenses.
Company cards are distributed individually, and each employee's spending can be checked in real time, with managers able to set limits or credit the card remotely.
Adopting expense report software is also a good solution. The time saved is considerable for all concerned. Receipts can be scanned or photographed in a matter of seconds, then transmitted electronically to the accounting department. The risk of errors is reduced, which indirectly also limits costs.
On an automated platform, all relevant members have an instant overview of expense claim processing. Data is easily accessible from anywhere with an Internet connection.