Managing Expense Sheets
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Managing Expense Sheets


Employees can be given permission to manage other employee's Expense Sheets. A manager can view, edit and even delete Expense Sheets, depending upon their permission level. Any employee whose Permission Level allows expense sheet management (for example Administrator or Manager) can manage Expense Sheets and will see the Expense Sheets tab. If you do not see the Expense Sheets tab then you have not been given a Permission Level with expense sheet management permissions. You can check an employee's Permission Level from the Employees tab.


If the employee's permission level allows only limited expense sheet management then the employee will need to be added to the permission list for one or more employee groups. This can be done by clicking the Groups link under the Employees tab, then clicking one of the groups in the list. In the Permissions section for the group click the Edit button and add the employee to the permission list with the appropriate permission level. The Groups topic has more information.


Note: You can use expense sheet management permissions to create "expense keepers" - employees with the ability to enter expenses for other employees. This avoids the need to log in as another user in order to fill out their expense sheet. In implementing expense keepers it is recommended that you create a new Permission Level with only the minimum required expense sheet permissions such as manage, edit and create. The Permission Levels topic has more information.


Expense sheet Lookup


To list employee Expense Sheets click the Expenses tab, navigate to Expense Sheets, enter an appropriate Start date, then click the Search button. You can optionally enter a Finish date and Status in order to narrow down the list of returned Expense Sheets.


If you do not find any Expense Sheets then you may have only limited expense sheet management permissions. As mentioned above, you may need to be added to the permission list for one or more employee groups.


Clicking a Time Period link in the list will load that employee's expense sheet. Depending upon your permission level, you may be able to edit or even delete this expense sheet.


Exporting Expense Sheets


If your permission level allows it you can export the list of Expense Sheets by clicking the tools button in the upper right of the list and then clicking the Export List link. This will export the expense sheet status information as displayed in the list to your local computer, in comma-separated value (CSV) format. This file can then be opened in Microsoft Excel or other applications that support the CSV format. You can optionally change this to Microsoft Excel's native format (XLS) by clicking the Preferences link on the Home tab.


Clicking the Export link will download the expense entries for each expense sheet in the list as a file that you can save on your local computer. This is useful for exporting expense entries to external systems such as Payroll or Accounting applications. You can optionally mark expense entries as being exported, so that you can avoid re-exporting the same data.


Expense Entry Corrections

Once an expense sheet has been marked as exported it cannot be unsubmitted (unlocked) for re-editing. You will need to make corrections to the expense sheet by clicking on the tools button and then View Expenses in order to view and manage expense entries. You can search for any expense entries by setting the parameters of the expense entries in search. These can include employee, date range, project, etc. You can view already-exported and processed expense entries and create correction expense entries as follows:


  1. Click into the expense entry you intend to correct.
  2. Clone the entry by clicking on the clone button.
  3. Edit the cloned entry to create a negative entry. If the entry is a mileage entry, change the quantity entry to negative, or if the entry is an expense amount entry, change the amount value to negative.
  4. Clone and edit the entry again and modify it to create the correct positive value of the correction entry.
  5. Submit and approve the pair of correction entries so they are ready to exported and processed.


This is a safeguard to avoid modifying previously exported time entries.


Note that administrators (those with the "Can Manage All" expense sheet permission) can bypass this restriction and still unsubmit a previously exported expense sheet, if the need arises.


Another option for getting access to expense sheet data is to run a Expense Details report. This report can be customized to only output the fields you require, and can be downloaded in a number of formats, including Microsoft Excel. The Reports topic has more information.


Importing Expense Sheet Data


If your permission level allows you to import expense data by clicking tools button in the upper right of the list and then clicking the Import link. The Importing/Exporting topic has more information generally on how import/export utilities work, including auto-import and auto-export features. Importing expense data has a few important features worth noting:


  1. You can prepare and expense import data file to import credit card data directly into the system.
  2. You should prepare this file to group expense entries to list entries by employee first and entry date second. You can have multiple groupings of expense entries grouped by employee then date.
  3. When you import these expense entries each expense entry will be assigned an auto-generated Expense Sheet ID for each employee. The series of expense entries imported will be grouped into a unique expense sheet using this unique expense sheet ID. 


Printing Expense Sheets


The 'Print List' option in tools menu in the upper right corner of the expense sheet list allows you to download a printable hard copy summary list report of all of the Expense Sheets in the list. You can also print out multiple Expense Sheets for signing, for instance, by clicking on the Print Expense Sheets button. Note that, rather than printing the entire list, you can print selected Expense Sheets by clicking the checkbox on each row before selecting the 'Print' option.


You can also print individual Expense Sheets by clicking into an individual expense sheet the time period link in the expense sheet list, then clicking the 'Print' view button in the upper-right corner of the expense sheet. This will download a printable version of the expense sheet suitable for printing.