Creatrope

A spot check among friends showed this this handy technique was not nearly so common or well known as I thought, so I thought I’d share it.
Getting reimbursed for business expenses is ‘found’ money and a lot of people don’t do it very well or don’t take it seriously enough. If you’re in the 35% tax bracket and the company owes you $100, you have to earn $153 just to make that up if you forget to get reimbursed!

This hack went a long way to getting reimbursement for 100% of my expenses in a timely manner.

My company seems reluctant to issue corporate-billed credit cards even for items and travel that are reimbursable. When I had this at previous companies, it made expense reporting a snap. For some time, I reluctantly mixed my business and personal expenses on the same card, but never liked this. I’d sometimes miss transactions, or some would take a long time to appear, and sometimes I was genuine unsure whether it was reimbursable a month after the fact. Being extraordinarily conservative in this matter, I would not claim them.

Then it struck me one day after getting the usual inundation of credit card offers in the mail. There was no reason why I should not have a separate credit card and use it exclusively for reimbursable business expenses. When it comes time to pay that bill (which I still must pay on my own, and in a timely manner), I know that 100% of the items on it need to be claimed. I kept this copy handy and if necessary can check it off as reimbursements arrive from the company.

An extra benefit arises if a receipt is missing. First, you know that you still have a valid claim, second, if you’re a bit privacy-oriented as I am, you don’t need to submit the entire personal credit card statement - just your business credit card statement .

Clearly, to maximize the organizational benefit of this, you need to put everything reimbursable on this card (and not use your personal card or cash).
If you keep a separate company phone or use your phone predominantly for business, consider assigning the charges for your phone to this card as well.

I don’t claim enough expenses where I’d pay to get a second card with benefits (like frequent flier miles). One of the freebie cards works well enough.
This strategy might also make some sense even if your expenses are not reimbursable.  Depending on your tax situation, you might be able to claim these business expenses, and having them on a separate statement might still be convenient.

There’s no reason why this method couldn’t be extended to other types of expenses that you want to ‘bin’ - landlord, home improvement, etc. Just remember to pay them all!