Work paying for hotel - would you do this?

[stagione]

Work are paying for my hotel when I attend a conference. It’s on a Thursday night and then I am taking annual leave for the Friday so that I can explore the town the conference is in.

Our budget is £300 a night. About 10 miles from the conference town is a gorgeous 5* hotel. It’s £600 a night.

Would it be unacceptable to book this hotel and pay the £300 difference? I’ve done this in the past but it’s been £40 here or there and always when the hotel is in the town where the conference is.

I could do the conference and dinner and then pay for my own cab over to the hotel.

Surely this depends on how the company do it though?

At our company we have an online booking portal thing and it just goes straight on the company account, we have to provide a valid reason if we go over the budget.

It's not so much about the hotel issuing two invoices more that the company would need to pay the full thing up front then settle the difference directly with OP

It could be entirely possible especially if you are booking and paying yourself rather than via your company and then only claiming back the 300 max but the only person who can say for sure is your manager and/or HR.

You may find that there's a preferential rate at hotels in the city for conference delegates. Or that your work can get special rates.

Just because £300 is the limit doesn't mean you have to spend it

We have a rule in ours that while we can go up to £250 (our max), employees must look for "best value". Unless you could show this is the best value or there were exceptional circumstances why you had to stay there, it would be getting rejected.

My first thought too. You'll not get much value out of the upgrade for the faff and money involved.
See if you can get a better two night deal from the expensive hotel maybe.

Honestly, I wouldn't bother with it. For a one night work trip, a Holiday Inn, or similar, does the job and doesn't raise eyebrows.

If it comes up as an exception in Finance, you'll be regarded as excessive and precious and they will laugh and gossip with their mates in HR, and your future expenses will be carefully interrogated.

At the risk of stating the extremely obvious, isn't the most straightforward way to find out simply to ask them? People on MN work for different companies than you, so cannot possibly know what your employer would accept.

We wouldn’t agree to this. Please check before you book!

But where's the fun in that?! 😉

We'd need an invoice, but could split the claim and not ask to be reimbursed the difference. I would always, always discuss with your manager before you do so just in case it breaches something somewhere. Also so that no colleagues find out where you stayed and think you are up to something and report you. If your manager knows then it's all above board.

So presumably you book the hotels for your employees rather than giving them a budget and they having to find their own hotel?
How do you calculate a carbon footprint of an hotel BTW?

Why would you even want to do this??

Your hotel is getting reimbursed so you’re not out of pocket but you’ll be paying out loads to stay there.
And you’ll barely get chance to enjoy it!

Book a much cheaper one that’s closer to the location.

Then save up and go away to the fancy hotel at a time when you can actually enjoy it and get your moneys worth.

No. You can find a decent hotel for less than £300. If you use your accommodation allowance from your employer to subsidise a very expensive hotel stay, you will be perceived as fiddling your expenses even if what you are doing is within the rules. If you insist on the £600-a-night hotel you should pay the entire £600 yourself.

Do t ask ransoms on the internet about your workplace policy!

ask work

Yes it’s a budget not a target. If the cheapest most appropriate hotel is £300 and you pay the whole bill then claim back then fair enough. My only thought is that you arrest work so will you get the full benefit?

It would raise eyebrows at our company - the limit would be there to cover busy periods - on occasion our team have had to pay over £250 for Premier Inn! But some people like to game their expense claims and we often need to have a quiet word. Op if you’re determined to stay in the £600 hotel you should clarify beforehand.

Seems a huge amount of money for a hotel you won't be at for long. If you are having dinner after the conference, presumably you won't be at your hotel until well into the evening and will have to check out next morning. However if it is worth it to you to get the opportunity and only pay half then go for it.

Lol NHS budget is 75pn for our mandatory course and only get that if over 75miles each way. My partner has company credit card n booked the bellagio!

You could buy a bed for £600!! That’s what you are paying for 1 night - madness.

Book the extra night of you I’ve the Friday off and stay an extra night.

I travel for work and have done for many years and in every company I have worked for I have had to book any corporate travel through the company portal. This is to ensure I am covered by the company’s travel insurance (as well as getting preferential corporate rates)

So booking my own hotel would not be allowed under our travel policy

Your company may be different which is why you would be better off checking with your manager than MN

This wouldn't be allowed at my workplace. All travel and hotels etc have to be booked on the travel system and paid for centrally. Think it is also something to do with insurance.

My DH regularly stays an extra day or two in an exotic/interesting location he’s done a work trip to, taking personal leave - so if you are asking is it okay to tag a day’s leave onto a business trip then yes, so long as your manager/team is happy to authorise leave for that day as they would for any other leave/absence. They have the right to decline it though, obviously.

re the hotel - you need to contact your manager/expenses department. No-one here can advise you on the intricacies of your company’s expenses policy.

Otherwise, I am stunned at the bizarre things people ask on MN when pinging a quick email to their boss would resolve the matter within minutes. 🤦🏽‍♀️

I love MN ❤️, it often reinforces for me my place in the pecking order. I did stay away for work in my last job and that was maximum of £90 a night , and we were allowed up to £14 ish to buy dinner ....The NHS and local authorities are skint though, like their employees in the main 😳

Exactly! It's absolutely crazy that people ask this stuff on Mumsnet. Who cares what mumsnetters think?? It's entirely down to your work policies. They're different in every organisation so what is deemed acceptable to random mumsnetters working in x place might be a sackable offence to you or vice versa

I think it depends on your company.

I'd be irritated if one of my employees did this. If everybody else was staying at a £200 hotel for the conference and you expensed £300 just because you wanted to stay in a fancy hotel, it's unnecessary spend really.