Concur Guidelines

Employee non-travel reimbursements (EBERs) are now done in Concur.  Since Concur was designed for travel reimbursements, we have to be creative completing some of the fields.  

Like travel, EBERs must have a Request and an Expense.  Unlike travel, the Request does not have to be done before incurring expenses, but will need to be submitted, and approved, before the Expense reimbursement can be submitted.

• Each employee must request their own reimbursements using Concur.  
• ACs are no longer able to do them for faculty.
• Hospitality forms will still be required, if applicable, but will no longer need approval signatures, since Concur already requires approvals.  
• Your department staff can provide you with the hospitality form that you will then upload into Concur.
• Your department staff can also provide you with the appropriate funding source numbers to use.
• The old EBER form does not need to be included.
• Allowable reimbursements:  hospitality, commodity
• Non-allowable reimbursements: software, third-party payments, gift cards, IT hardware, services, travel.

Option 1 – blanket request - for multiple hospitality EBERs within a month or semester:

• A) Concur Request:
  • Hospitality only: 
    Concur Subject Line Protocol: SemesterYear-EBER/HOSP. 
    For instance, Fall24-EBER/HOSP 
  • Hospitality with Local Mileage only (can be one request):
    Concur Subject Line Protocol: SemesterYear- Mileage/HOSP.
    For instance, Fall24-Mileage/HOSP
  • Non-Hospitality Business Expense: EBER: Supply Reimbursement $[Enter Dollar Amount] 
• B) Concur Expense (once request has been approved):
  • Multiple expense submissions can refer back to one blanket request
  • One receipt per Concur expense submission
  • Attach completed hospitality form along with itemized receipt
     

Option 2 – one-time purchase request

• A) Concur Request:
  • Subject Line Protocol:  EBER and Description.
    For instance:  EBER F22 Dinner Candidate or EBER 9/1/24 Lab Supplies
• B) Concur Expense:
  • One receipt per expense submission
    Attach completed hospitality form, if applicable, along with itemized receipt
     

See Concur Non-Employee Travel Guide (PDF) for complete information.

1. Before travel – students must complete the Travel Certification Form (PDF) and submit it to their faculty sponsor.
2. The faculty sponsor emails apinvoice@sonoma.edu to tell them they will be arranging travel for a student.  Include the student's name, address, SSU ID, SSU email, and phone number.  Once the response is received, the faculty sponsor goes into Concur and creates a travel request for the student.
3. Within 30 days of returning from travel, the student will need to submit receipts and travel information to their faculty sponsor who will enter their reimbursement request via CONCUR. 

All guides referenced below can be found on the Financial Services website.

1. Complete the HSSA Travel Authorization Form. Faculty must obtain their Chair's signature (no Dean's signature is required). If the Chair is traveling, the Chair must obtain the Dean's signature by sending the form to hssa@sonoma.edu. After receiving the signed form, attach it to your request in Concur. 
2. Set up Concur Profile (see Concur Profile Setup Guide PDF).
3. Submit a Concur travel request (see Concur User Guide PDF), and upload your signed Travel Authorization with the request.
   1. A Concur travel request must be submitted for all university business travel (conference, research, etc.), even if travel occurs during non-paid or non-teaching days, and even if you are not requesting any reimbursement.
   2. Travel approval requests must be submitted at least 30 days before travel.
   3. If funding has not been approved, the travel request must be submitted as Liability Only/Unfunded (See user guide)
   4. You may purchase airfare within Concur using the university “ghost credit card”, which means you will not be paying for it.  At this time, only airfare can be purchased using the ghost card.
   5. Note that an approved travel request only means you are approved to travel. To ensure compliance with university and state policies, a careful review of expenses will be made once the Travel Expense Report is submitted (See next step).
4. Submit Concur Travel Expenses Report for reimbursement
   1. If you are asking for travel reimbursement, you will need to go into Concur two separate times for each travel event – once to request approval to travel, and once to request reimbursement.  If you are not being reimbursed, you would go in once to request approval to travel.
   2. If you previously submitted an unfunded request and have received funding, you can add expense reports to your approved unfunded request.
   3. Travel Expense Reports must be submitted within 60 days after travel (see Concur User Guide PDF).  If you did not receive your travel award in time to meet the 60-day requirement, you can request an exception from the AVP for Administration and Finance (David Crozier; david.crozier@sonoma.edu).

See Concur Non-Employee Travel Guide (PDF) for complete information.

1. Before travel – Volunteer employees and interview candidates must complete the Travel Certification Form, and submit it to the faculty sponsor.
2. Guest travelers must complete and submit a 204 Vendor Data Form through the secure upload link.
3. Once Accounts Payable processes the 204 Vendor form, the faculty sponsor emails apinvoice@sonoma.edu the supplier name, and requests Concur access.
4. After a reply is received from AP, the faculty sponsor goes into Concur and submits an expense reimbursement request.
5. No Concur travel request is required for guest travelers.