Add an Expense - Nightly Lodging

A hotel bill typically contains a variety of expenses including room fees, taxes, parking, meals, valet, telephone charges, and personal items. These expenses must be itemized so that they can be accounted for correctly. The Itemization feature allows you to quickly itemize room rates and taxes, which are the same for each night of your stay. You can then itemize the remaining charges on your hotel bill.

The process is to create the lodging (hotel) expense and then use the Itemizations tab to split the total expense amount into the proper expense types.

To create a lodging expense:

  1. With the report open, click Add Expense.
  2. Either create a new expense or select a lodging item from the Available Expenses list.
  3. On the Details tab, create the main expense, completing the required and optional fields as directed by your company.
  4. Click the Itemizations tab.
  5. Then:

    • If you started the expense with a card charge or e-receipt (from the Available Expenses list), the itemizations may have been created automatically, depending on the hotel charge details provided by the vendor. If so:

      • If there are any alerts (exceptions), make the appropriate changes to clear the alert.
      • Provide any other missing information.
      • When done, click Save Itemization.
    • If you manually created the expense or if the vendor did not provide the hotel charge details, you likely have to manually itemize the lodging expense. To do so, follow the steps below.
To manually itemize the lodging expense:
  1. If the lodging expense is not automatically itemized for you, on the Itemizations tab, click Create Itemization.
  2. Select the desired expense type, such as Hotel. Your company determines the name of the expense type. It may be called Room Rate, Lodging, Hotel, or something similar.
  3. In the Entry Type list, select Recurring Itemization. (The Single Itemization option is discussed later on this page.)
  4. For the Your hotel room rate was section, click The Same Every Night. (The Not The Same option is discussed later on this page.)
  5. Enter the room rate, tax, and other recurring charges.
  6. Click Save Itemization. The page refreshes.
  7. If there is a remaining amount to be itemized (other charges, for example, for incidentals or room service), the remaining amount is displayed at the top of the Itemizations tab. To itemize the remaining amount:
    • Click Create Itemization.
    • Select the expense type for the remaining amount.
    • Click the Recurring Every Night check box to repeat the itemization for each day of the stay, if applicable.
    • Click Save Itemization.
    • Repeat the process until the remaining amount is zero.

"Not the Same" Tab

If the nightly rates are different, use the Not the Same tab (instead of the The Same Every Night tab) to define the rates for each date of the hotel stay.

Single Itemization Entry Type

Generally, the entry type is Recurring Itemization, which you use to define nightly rates, fees, and taxes.

You can use Single Itemization to define one-time charges, like deposit amounts, or to enter a missed itemization from a hotel stay that was automatically itemized on your behalf from detailed e-receipt information.