The biggest drawback to using federal rates is that the government establishes a
government rate for paying lodging which they will not exceed for reimbursement
purposes.   Hotels usually will accept this rate with proof that you work for
the government. If you don't, or even if you do and the hotel does not honor the
government limit,  you the traveler are left having to pay the difference, which
is usually substantial. Kari Hastings
 ----------
 From:  Michael Pelletier [SMTP:xxxxxx@EDC.ORG]
 Sent:  Wednesday, February 21, 2001 3:32 PM
 To:  xxxxxx@HRINET.ORG
 Subject:  [RESADM-L] Use of federal per diems for travel reimbursement

 At my institution we are currently looking at our current policy of
 reimbursing travel expenses based on submission of receipts for actual
meal
 and hotel costs.  It has been suggested to us that we pay our travelers
the
 federal per diems in order to simplify life for our Accounting
department.

 Concerns have been voiced about the adequacy of the federal per diems.
I
 have investigated the travel policies of a number of large research
 institutions and find that some institutions use the federal per diem
 allowances and some have set reimbursement levels that are higher than
the
 federal levels.   For those of you operating under policies that allow
per
 diem reimbursement at rates above the federal levels, have you
experienced
 questions in audits and have you entered into negotiations with your
 cognizant audit agencies to establish that the reimbursement levels in
your
 policies are reasonable and allowable?

 Michael Pelletier
 Education Development Center, Inc.
 xxxxxx@EDC.org

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