Can my employer take back ageed and paid expenses?

noodle944

I work for a company where I incur expenses, such as hotels, meals, etc.
I pay for these using a personal credit card and make a claim at the end of the month.
However, I have been made aware that there are a number of expenses, dating back to the start of 2009 where I have been 'overpaid' as there was no receipt given.
My question is: Can they ask me to repay these, even though they were agreed and authorised at the time??
Thanks in advance
N

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Googlewhacker

noodle944 wrote: »

I work for a company where I incur expenses, such as hotels, meals, etc.
I pay for these using a personal credit card and make a claim at the end of the month.
However, I have been made aware that there are a number of expenses, dating back to the start of 2009 where I have been 'overpaid' as there was no receipt given.
My question is: Can they ask me to repay these, even though they were agreed and authorised at the time??
Thanks in advance
N

So you are accepting that they overpaid the expense, if so I would have thought you have to pay this back. In a similar fashion to if they over pay wages you 99.9% time you have to pay this back.

SarEl

Yes, this falls under the terms of "error" - the fact that you should have complied with the terms and supplied receipts for claimed expenses was clear and you knew this. The employer made an error in not double-checking this, but they do have the right to reclaim the money paid if you did not comply with the requirement to provide receipts.

suited-aces

Yip, sometimes in my auditing work we come across errors that are subsequently resolved.

noodle944

Googlewhacker wrote: »

So you are accepting that they overpaid the expense, if so I would have thought you have to pay this back. In a similar fashion to if they over pay wages you 99.9% time you have to pay this back.

I am not saying this at all. They are saying that I have been overpaid, due to not providing a receipt. I have however sent my credit card statements showing the transactions.

noodle944

Its worth noting that I also have no terms for claiming my expenses and nothing written into my contract saying that I must provide a receipt on claiming.

Surely, as they have been approved and I can prove the expense they have no recourse?

KiKi

The difficulty here is that you have no receipt. A credit card statement doesn't tell them what the money was spent on. You could spend £45 on a new shirt for yourself and tell them you are claiming back petrol.

I wouldn't expect this to be written into your contract; they would have either a policy on employee expenses, or a statement in an employee handbook explaining receipts.

If you don't provide receipts then I would endorse that you shouldn't be paid; you could be spending the money on anything you like! Whether they can claim them retrospectively if there is no policy is another thing, but I suspect the employer is well within their rights to ask for it back as they don't have proof of what you were claiming for.

Firstly you need to ask to see the expenses policy. If there isn't one, you *may* be able to argue that you didn't know you had to provide a receipt as it's not written down, and that the company accepted it at the time, so it became custom and practice not to provide one.

However, this is tenuous and I don't know how successful you'd be.

HTH
KiKi

axomoxia

KiKi wrote: »

The difficulty here is that you have no receipt. A credit card statement doesn't tell them what the money was spent on. You could spend £45 on a new shirt for yourself and tell them you are claiming back petrol.

I would have thought a line in a credit card statement saying "BP South Mimms Services £45" is likeley to petrol and not a shirt, as would "Travellogde runcorne" on the same day you where at a meeting in runcorn is a pretty big giveaway that they are genuine....

I think the OPs employers is claiming "overpaid", rather than actually having overpaid - from what the OPs the expenses claimed were genuine, and agreed by management previously...

KiKi

axomoxia wrote: »

I would have thought a line in a credit card statement saying "BP South Mimms Services £45" is likeley to petrol and not a shirt, as would "Travellogde runcorne" on the same day you where at a meeting in runcorn is a pretty big giveaway that they are genuine....

IF that's what the CC statement says. And if those are the sorts of expenses being claimed. But from the company's POV there's nothing to stop the OP spending £20 on soft drink from a Shell station either; it's not necessarily petrol, and they could legitimately claim that was the case if there's no receipt.

I think the OPs employers is claiming "overpaid", rather than actually having overpaid - from what the OPs the expenses claimed were genuine, and agreed by management previously...

Yes, I understood that - I don't see anywhere in my post that I indicated otherwise! I'm not saying they have overpaid, but they are now claiming that without receipts, the payments have been made in error. And if there is a policy to support that, the OP will struggle to make a case.

KiKi

SarEl

KiKi wrote: »

The difficulty here is that you have no receipt. A credit card statement doesn't tell them what the money was spent on. You could spend £45 on a new shirt for yourself and tell them you are claiming back petrol.

I wouldn't expect this to be written into your contract; they would have either a policy on employee expenses, or a statement in an employee handbook explaining receipts.

If you don't provide receipts then I would endorse that you shouldn't be paid; you could be spending the money on anything you like! Whether they can claim them retrospectively if there is no policy is another thing, but I suspect the employer is well within their rights to ask for it back as they don't have proof of what you were claiming for.

Firstly you need to ask to see the expenses policy. If there isn't one, you *may* be able to argue that you didn't know you had to provide a receipt as it's not written down, and that the company accepted it at the time, so it became custom and practice not to provide one.

However, this is tenuous and I don't know how successful you'd be.

HTH
KiKi

Good argument but unlikely to fly. I suspect that someone might have noticed if the OP had never provided any receipts for expernditure, and if they have provided other receipts for expenditure then the OP knows to provide receipts. It therefore follows that the OP is going to struggle to clain custom and practice if they have provided other receipts but not all receipts.