The most common grievance we hear about expense handling is the unnecessary requirement to enter expenses twice.
Take this example, yourself or a fee earner has taken a taxi to a court hearing on behalf of a client. This was not paid for by the business, so will need to be reimbursed, however it also needs to be added as a disbursement so that the client pays for it.
The most efficient way to handle this is:
1. Set up a 'loan' account (you can call it whatever you like) under Current Liabilities for the person who paid for the taxi. For e.g. you can call this "Joe Blogs loan to practice" or whatever works for your practice. This needs to be set up as a bank account so that it is accessible in the Spend Money window
2. From the Matters window, find and highlight the relevant matter and click on New Matter Expense (you can also click on new matter expense from within the Work in Progress window, or the Spend money window)
3. Enter the incurred date (the date the taxi was taken)
4. In the paid dropdown, choose Paid
5. The date paid should be the same as the incurred date as presumably the taxi was paid at the end of the ride
6. In the Bank a/c field, chose the 'loan' account you set up in step 1
7. In the Type dropdown choose the relevant payment type e.g. credit card
8. Choose the relevant Payee (i.e. the taxi company)
9. If relevant, add in the invoice # / Source reference
10. Type in the invoice text - remember, this is what the client will see on their invoice
11. The class field should already be pre-populated with Matter Expense. This is correct, no need to make any changes
12. The matter field should also be already populated based on the matter you highlighted initially, check it is correct, however there shouldn't need to be any changes made if the correct one was initially highlighted
13. Type in the Inc GST amount
14. Choose the type of GST (e.g. 10%, less than 10% etc) - if the default 10% GST is correct, press the tab button on your keyboard
15. Based on your selection in point 14, SILQ will calculate the correct amount of GST as well the Amount ex GST
16. In the Expense a/c choose the relevant expense account (e.g. wherever you would normally expense a taxi ride to)
17. Press save
This will mean that when it comes time to invoice the client, the disbursement has already been entered and it will be charged to them.
Finish entering all matter expenses that need to be reimbursed.
Now, you need have the expense/s reimbursed.
18. Navigate to the Spend Money window
19. Click on New Spend
20. Enter the incurred date (the date the taxi was taken)
21. In the paid dropdown, choose Paid (on the assumption you will be paying this today)
22. The date paid should be the same as the incurred date, being today (again, on the assumption you are making the payment today)
23. In the Bank a/c field, select the practice bank account that you reimbursing the money from
24. In the Type dropdown choose the relevant payment type e.g. EFT / Transfer
25. Choose the relevant Payee (i.e. the staff member)
26. If relevant, add in the invoice # / Source reference
27. Type in the invoice text - e.g. reimbursement for expenses of Joe Blogs
28. The class field in this instance should be Other (not Matter Expense)
29. The matter field should be un-editable as it is irrelevant
30. Type in the Inc GST amount
31. Choose the type of GST (e.g. 10%, less than 10% etc) - if the default 10% GST is correct, press the tab button on your keyboard
32. Based on your selection in point 14, SILQ will calculate the correct amount of GST as well the Amount ex GST
33. In the Expense a/c choose the 'loan' account you set up in step 1
34. Press save
Of course, you will physically then need to transfer the funds to the staff member from your bank account.
Note: As the first Spend Money deals with the expense account the reimbursement is just a transfer of money. This will effectively cancel out the loan account. You should always be aiming for a $0 balance in the loan account.
You will need repeat steps 18 to 34 for each person within the practice that needs to be reimbursed.