Faculty/Staff Travel

The Basics

• All employee travel is now handled through Concur. There are two main components: Requests and Expenses.
• You will create your own requests/expense reports.
• You are responsible for making your own bookings and other travel arrangements. See “Before the Trip”.
• Make sure to get receipts for everything (except meals). Credit card statements will be rejected!
• Please look through the Concur documentation.
• See UNC Travel Services’ Get Started page for your responsibilities and a helpful checklist.

Things to Keep in Mind

• When you create a request or expense report, please name it either the conference name or the destination and beginning trip date.
• Items like supplies, poster printing, local hiring, etc are usually not considered travel expenses. See the section on cash advances under purchasing.
• Full-time permanent employees may apply for a Travel and Expense card. This is a corporate Visa card that can only be used for travel and business entertainment.
• Don’t assume you’ll be paid back for a non-standard expense; please ask your travel contact.
• You can only be paid back for your own travel expenses, meaning your plane ticket, your hotel room, etc. If you pay for someone else’s hotel room/flight/etc., you will not be paid back, although it’s possible they could be.

Your Contact

Before the Trip/Travel Requests

• If your trip will include lodging, airfare, or a car rental, you MUST file a travel request through Concur.
  • The request must be approved before you can book anything or pay registration.
  • Please include estimates for all anticipated expenses in the request, including airfare, mileage, meals, registration, etc.
  • Please note: a request is not an advance. If you need money for an international trip, see “Advance” below.
• Once your request is approved:
  • You can book airfare, lodging, and rental car expenses through Concur.
    • Airfare: UNC will pay airfare directly. You will need your request number.
    • Car rental:
      • If you want UNC to pay your car rental directly, you must book the car a) from Enterprise and b) by calling World Travel and requesting direct billing. This will incur a $10 fee that you must pay out-of-pocket (using T&E or personal card). You will need your request number and you must explicitly request direct billing.
      • If you choose to book through the Concur website, you will have to use a personal card or a T&E card.
    • Lodging: For hotels, you must provide either a personal credit card or a T&E card.
      • Note: conference rates for hotels are unlikely to be available through Concur bookings. If that happens, you may book through the conference instead of through Concur.
      • If you plan to use Airbnb or any other non-hotel lodging option, you must fill out the Third-Party Lodging Request Form and include it in your request documentation.
      • If your lodging is going to cost more than $300/night, you must complete the Excess Lodging Justification form.
    • Registration: The department can pay registration and abstract fees via the pcard if you do not have a T&E card.
  • All out-of-pocket expenses will be paid back to you after the trip.

Filing a Travel Request

International Travel – Extra steps required for international travel

Note: Once a request is approved, you can create multiple expense reports from it. It’s likely that things like airfare and registration, for example, will have to go into an expense report before the trip, while the rest of the expenses will be reported after.

After the Trip

You must file for reimbursement within 30 days of the end of your trip.

Reimbursements happen after the trip, when the university pays you back for your expenditures.

If you received an advance, you must now account for all the money you received.

All receipts should have your name and show that the bill has been paid. A credit card or bank statement by itself is not sufficient documentation.

Documentation breakdown

Airfare: All airfare should have been booked through Concur. If you had to pay for local flights on an international trip, provide the receipt.

Ground transportation: If you drove your personal car, provide the origin, destination, and mileage of each leg of the trip. For rental cars, provide the rental receipts and any gas receipts you paid for. For taxis/rideshares, provide the origin and destination of each trip and include receipts. Write the tip on the receipt if it’s not already included.

Hotel: A booking or reservation is not a valid receipt. The hotel receipt should have your name as the occupant. If you shared a room and did not split the cost, we will need the details of the other person’s reimbursement. The receipt should list out the charges; a credit card receipt showing a lump sum is not sufficient as it may include laundry, meals, gift shop, movie rentals, etc. Note that if you are using federal per diem rates, you cannot be reimbursed more than the federal room rate. If you used an AirBNB and have not already given the travel preparer the Third-Party Lodging Request Form, you will need to. If your hotel bill is greater than $300/night, you will need to fill out the Excess Lodging Justification form.

Meals/Per diem: Meals are reimbursed at a fixed rate called per diem. For a more in-depth explanation, see Understanding Per Diem. For the meals you can claim on the first and last days of the trip, see Policy on Allowable Travel Expenses. No receipts are necessary unless the sponsor itself requires them (rare but possible).

Medical: If you are traveling internationally, you may be reimbursed for necessary vaccinations and prescriptions (such as antimalarial drugs). Provide receipts.

Other: Baggage fees, internet access, laundry (only for long international trips), parking, phone calls, phone cards (international only), and other miscellaneous expenses must be accompanied by receipts. Tips to airport employees are reimbursable at $2 a bag; no receipts are required.

Passport/visa fees: Provide receipts as best you can. This may include photo fees, mailing/shipping fees, etc. Multiple-entry visas will be reimbursed via a different mechanism and can be reimbursed before the trip. Single-entry visas will go on the travel and must wait until after the trip.

Forms and References

Concur Documentation
Get Started
UNC Policy on Travel Expenses
UNC Policy on Transportation Expenses
UNC Travel website – This is a very helpful overview site of how travel at UNC works.
Third Party Lodging Request Form – If you’re not using a hotel, this must be filled out before the trip. Includes AirBNB.
Excess Lodging Justification
Travel Decision Tree