Work expenses.

emmmmsb

Hi all. So I just wondered if anyone can help because I’m at my wits ends with it all. So my partner is the only earner at the moment. My partner has worked as an engineer at this company for nearly 15 years now. Anyway my issue is he will use a lot of our money for work expenses throughout the month so this will be buying bits for the jobs and also parking and this can cost a lot each month. We get this back but it could be a 4-6 week wait. Living off one wage is tight as it is but to then keep having to fork
out for his expenses isn’t helping. Most months we are in our overdraft and credit card to buy food etc. These expenses can easily mount up to over £500 if more a month. I don’t no what to do anymore as he says it’s written In his contract but i don’t think it’s fair to let a family fork out this type of money when things are so tight as it is and they won’t be paying our overdraft fees. We could easily manage our money well if it wasn’t for his expenses, it has caused a lot of disagreements In the past but I can not see this changing until the company decide to give some of the engineers company cards to use instead of there own wage. I mean I wouldn’t mind if it was a bit of parking money here there but it’s not its everyday pretty much. Surely this is wrong??! He has approached the matter a few times with his work but it hasn’t made much difference. He also doesn’t want to ruffle feathers because he needs a job
and he does like it. What can I do? I’m feel like the company need a wake up call to how this effects family’s becasue there must be others that struggle from having to fork out on expenses and not many people will have a spare amount of money to do this. I know we definitely don’t. So any advice would be amazing thank you!! 

TELLIT01

He needs to tell them he can't afford to subsidise them and they will need to provide a company credit card for him to charge work related purchases to.

El_Torro

Does he use a personal credit card for company expenses? If so does he get the expense payment from his employer back before the credit card bill is due? Many credit cards give cash back or other benefits so in the long run this can be more beneficial than using a company credit card. I know this doesn't help with immediate cash flow though.

Putting his foot down might be the best course of action here. Problem is none of us knows how his employer will react. Especially if his colleagues are using the same arrangement and none of them are complaining. 

emmmmsb

He has done this many times. There’s an alarm team aswell and they arranged a meeting with manager/boss to see if something could get arranged to help support the parking costs and they were just told no. Thing is there paying London parking prices so it’s not cheap. Just very frustrating.

la531983

Think the best thing to do then is to set up a credit card himself for the sole purpose of work expenses.

Niv

I feel for you OP. I am in a similar situation expenses wise. We used to have company cards but they got taken off us as some were abusing it so now all expenses have to be paid out of our own money and claimed back. I use chase so I at least get a bit of cash back from it and am fortunate that it does not put me in my overdraft.

If the company wont budge, my best suggestion is to use a credit card for work expenses - I have done this in the past and it worked well in that the expense were paid before the CC bill was due. Also, an opportunity to find a card that has some benefit to you.

emmmmsb

El_Torro said:

Does he use a personal credit card for company expenses? If so does he get the expense payment from his employer back before the credit card bill is due? Many credit cards give cash back or other benefits so in the long run this can be more beneficial than using a company credit card. I know this doesn't help with immediate cash flow though.

Putting his foot down might be the best course of action here. Problem is none of us knows how his employer will react. Especially if his colleagues are using the same arrangement and none of them are complaining. 

Yes I have thought about this actually. Maybe worth another think and look at. My issue is they don’t always pay him back until the job is invoiced
so could be up to 6-8 weeks. 

This company has just been taken over by a well
knowm company. Apart of me wants to go to the papers or somthing just to scare them so they look into it again. But think my partner would be mortified if I did that so I wouldn’t. He’s not the only engineer that has brought this up with company. But the engineers just end up carrying on suppose for an easy life. But it makes finances so hard to manage when realy we could manage just fine if it wasn’t for these work expenses. 

saajan_12

Ultimately there's no magic solution if an employer wants A (employee pays and they reimburse later) and the employee wants B (employer pays upfront). Either 
1. Demand B and take whatever concequences of 'ruffling feathers'
2. Put up with A
3. Quit. 

emmmmsb

saajan_12 said:

Ultimately there's no magic solution if an employer wants A (employee pays and they reimburse later) and the employee wants B (employer pays upfront). Either 
1. Demand B and take whatever concequences of 'ruffling feathers'
2. Put up with A
3. Quit. 

Yep I think you’re right. I just feel it’s so morally wrong to put people in these situations. Don’t get me wrong all our bills are payed and the money that we have left I can manage with but then the expenses start and it’s game over.

Flugelhorn

I think they need to go back to the days of petty cash and someone reimbursing on the day - they would soon find another solution.

I had similar with medical indemnity - it was about £15k a year and the company had to reimburse about £11K - they wanted to do it monthly but I had had to pay the whole lot up front. Fortunately someone had enough sense to see that this was a bit much to fork out and wait ages to get back

emmmmsb

Niv said:

I feel for you OP. I am in a similar situation expenses wise. We used to have company cards but they got taken off us as some were abusing it so now all expenses have to be paid out of our own money and claimed back. I use chase so I at least get a bit of cash back from it and am fortunate that it does not put me in my overdraft.

If the company wont budge, my best suggestion is to use a credit card for work expenses - I have done this in the past and it worked well in that the expense were paid before the CC bill was due. Also, an opportunity to find a card that has some benefit to you.

Yeah I think this was the case at some point. But he’s never had a company card all the time he’s worked there. Honesty if we didn’t have work exspences to fork out all the time. Things would be so much easier. I think that’s why I find it so frustrating