Meals & Incidental Expenses Method (M&IE)

The meals and incidental expenses (only M&IE) method is a statutory settlement method in the United States, according to which travelers receive reimbursement for business expenses for meals and incidental expenses (as described in U.S. tax laws) by per diems and not on the basis of receipts. Accommodation is not taken into account in reimbursement amounts and is to be reimbursed based on receipts (actual costs). Incidental expenses include costs for laundry, dry-cleaning, tips, and other expenses directly related to a trip.

The U.S. government specifies tax-free per diems for inside continental United States (CONUS) and for outside the continental United States (OCONUS). These rates vary according to location. Employees are reimbursed according to the rates valid for the location at which they are present at 12:00 midnight local time. If the trip ends before midnight, the location where the traveler is during the last minute of the trip applies. This is called the "Midnight Rule".

Features

Trip provision variant 81 is the basis for the M&IE method. You can import the per diems from the Internet. For more information, see Customizing for Travel Expenses under Trip Reimbursement Amounts Automatic Import of Travel Expense Per Diems Import US Per Diems/Flat Rates from Internet .

You can set the per diems that you want to reimburse higher than the tax-free per diems. If amounts are above the statutory per diem rates, the difference amounts are taxed as wages and salaries to the employee in payroll accounting.

You can use the expense report constants to define the following:

Specific constants for U.S settlement with per diems according to M&IE
Constant	Use
FD_FA FD_FZ FD_KU	Part of the full meals per diem that is to be reimbursed for the first travel day of a multiday trip: FD_FA: tax-free portion FD_FZ: company-specific portion FD_KU: is not evaluated in the standard system. You can define this constant to determine separate reimbursement amounts, for example, to determine the reimbursement amounts for the customer billing document.
LD_FA LD_FZ LD_KU	Part of the full meals per diem that is to be reimbursed for the last travel day of a multiday trip: LD_FA: tax-free portion LD_FZ: company-specific portion LD_KU: is not evaluated in the standard system. You can define this constant to determine separate reimbursement amounts, for example, to determine the reimbursement amounts for the customer billing document.
SINGP	Portion of the full meals per diem that is to be reimbursed for one-day trips that are longer than 12 hours.
OCONU	If you want import the per diems for the OCONUS regions (including abroad) from the Internet, you need to set this constant.
OFDOM	If you want to change the per diems for the CONUS regions later, you need to set this constant.
OFFOR	If you want to change the per diems for the OCONUS regions later, you need to set this constant.

For more information about the constants, see Customizing for Travel Expenses under Master Data Check Travel Expense Constants .

You can use the Business Add-In BAdI: Change Reimbursement Amounts (REDUCT_TRIP_AMOUNT) to overwrite the per diem reimbursement amounts calculated by the system for an expense report. For more information, see Customizing for Travel Management under Business Add-Ins and User Exits in Travel Management Settlement BAdI: Change Reimbursement Amounts .