Travel and Entertainment Best Practices: Prevent Fraud and Comply with IRS Regs

Author: Mary Schaeffer

Expense reimbursement has never been trickier. The Tax Cut and Jobs Act changed the deductibility of some items, employees who have gotten more proficient at sneaking through items on their expense reports that shouldn’t be there, new remote work expense reimbursement issues and raft of new technologies impacting the function, make it difficult for those monitoring reimbursements. Throw in the lack of a clear policy covering remote work expenses at many organizations and you have a recipe for disaster. Companies everywhere are eyeing the bottom line and a growing number are insisting on rigid expense reimbursement policy compliance. Compliance must now not only be to the company policies, but also with IRS rules. Otherwise, you could end up answering not only to the CFO but also the IRS — and both are truly ugly. This course will also delve into the issue of refunds. While never a major issue in the past, when COVID hit and conferences and seminars were canceled, it became a major headache for the group monitoring travel. Alas, it also exposed a gapping loophole that facilitates fraud. This course will start with a review of IRS requirements and show how you can incorporate them into your policy. The course will then delineate the different games some employees play when attempting to get reimbursed.

Publication Date: November 2023

Designed For
Accountants, controllers, accounting managers, auditors (internal and external), Treasurers, CFOs, CEOs, accounts payable professionals, expense reimbursement staff, payroll professionals, procure-to-pay professionals, and travel managers.

Topics Covered

• Overview
• Implications of Tax Law changes
• Guidelines for Accountable Plan
• Evaluate your policies to ensure they are compliant with the IRS guidelines
• Best practices T&E policy that meets IRS regulations
• T&E Fraud Overview
• Fraud Problems Solved by the Detailed Receipt
• Other T&E Game Playing
• Best Practices to Address Fraud Issues
• Roundup of Best Practices & Closing Thoughts

Learning Objectives

• Recognize the guidelines you need to adhere to if your company's T&E expenses are to be deductible on the tax return
• Identify the new rules regarding deductibility of meals and entertainment under the new Tax Law
• Describe how to create an appropriate review process for all refunds owed the organization
• Describe how to integrate IRS requirements into your organization's T&E policy
• Identify common games some employees play with their expense reimbursement requests
• Recognize how your organization's expense reimbursement practices stack up against others in the business world
• Identify how to deal with the new expense reimbursement issues as technology has made some old best practices obsolete
• Recognize how to evaluate best practices to create an effective T&E policy and procedures
• Identify common expense reimbursement frauds some employees employ
• Recognize how to implement strong controls to deter expense reimbursement fraud

Level
Basic

Instructional Method
Self-Study

NASBA Field of Study
Accounting (2 hours)

Program Prerequisites
None

Advance Preparation
None