Expense Report
What is an expense report?
An expense report lists all the business-related purchases made by an employee or a company in a specific time period.
For an employee, an expense report lists all expenditures made by an employee that they want to be reimbursed for, such as travel expenses, gas, meals and parking. A receipt should usually accompany each expenditure as proof of purchase. Employee expense reports are generally submitted monthly, or per company policy.
For a business, the expense report details all the expenditures made by the business during a time period, usually monthly, quarterly or yearly. The report is usually split into sections based on departments and the type of expense. This allows the company to understand how money is being spent within the company, and is also necessary for tax purposes.
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What to include in your expense report
An expense report should usually contains some or all of the following information for each expenditure:
The name and contact information of the person submitting the report
The date of the purchase
The type or purpose of the expense (e.g. travel, meals, or phone charges)
The amount of money spent (usually accompanied by a receipt)
The method of payment (e.g.cash, bank transfer, company credit card, retained earnings)
A subtotal for each type of expense
A total sum of the amount spent
How to file an expense report
Each company has different ways of filing expense reports. They can be filed by hand, via email, or through an expense report system. Wether you are starting a business, or looking to streamline your business bookkeeping efforts — understanding more about how you file your expense reports should be an essential part of your business accounting process.