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How to Create an Expense Report + Templates

Key components of an expense report include the date expenses were paid, who the money went to, how much was specifically spent and the type of expense it was. Expense reports take the guesswork out of how much money your business is spending and where it’s going. Done correctly, you can accurately reimburse employees, simplify your taxes, and even make financial projections for the coming year. Here’s the rub — employees want reimbursement for the expenses they’ve paid out-of-pocket. But, on the flip side, employers want assurance that these expenses are fair and legitimate. An expense report provides a standardized process that addresses both these concerns.

Or use the corresponding app to photograph paper receipts as you get them. Sign up for a free Venngage account and show off your business savvy with the best expense report templates on the block. This expense report template is a good way to view your spending by category. Make this template your own by modifying the color palette and the icons to suit your expense categories.

Expense Sheet Template

This template automatically calculates a running subtotal of payments, and allows you to track expenditures by date, method of payment, or payee. You’ll find space to add even more detailed expense information to ease accounting tasks and make tracking easier. Though some business expenses are regular and recurring, every company also has a variety of sporadic purchases for ad hoc needs like the ones mentioned above. https://www.bookstime.com/articles/what-is-cost-accounting-and-how-does-it-working is crucial for completing reimbursements and keeping track of overall spending. In this piece, we’ll explain how to use an expense report template and the differences between traditional and digital reporting.

The key is finding the reporting solution that fits your company size and can be maintained accurately by you and your employees. It has typical business and travel expense categories and automatically calculates the total for you. (I’ll share more templates later!) But this is a good example of a visual expense report you could submit to be reimbursed for your business expenditures. From this monthly expense report template, you can see what the employee (Melanie Rodrigues) spent in the latter half of September 2024. This report itemizes her expenses by date, description, and category (Air/Travel, Lodging, Fuel, Meals, Entertainment and Other). When constructing an expense report, the primary goal is to identify the expense(s) to be included.

What Is Included in an Expense Report?

A business must simply ensure the requirements are met for each expense to take advantage of these benefits, which is why expense reports are an important tool for owners and their accounting partners. Many business expenses incurred by your employees while at work are tax-deductible. However, you cannot claim deductions for expenses unless you have them properly recorded with proof that they were actually incurred. Some business owners use their bank account or corporate card statements as a source to list all their deducible expenses. But it’s important to note that these statements may not reflect all expenses.

• It is very essential in expense reporting that the items that have been either purchased or acquired are accompanied by receipts.
• This report includes details about each expense and acts as an organized record for reimbursement or accounting purposes.
• Easily customize the spreadsheet by adding your company information and other details, then share the file with your employees.
• But, on the flip side, employers want assurance that these expenses are fair and legitimate.
• While there are a lot of expense report templates available on the internet, your best bet may be to use one of the many expense report templates available in Excel.

It can also easily be modified to include more columns or additional information. The example below shows a filled-out expense report template for a team member in the marketing department. Sally Brown listed her business expenses for the week of January 15th, which she submitted to her company’s financial team for approval.

How do you manage expense reports?

By having an insight on which category is driving costs you can start implementing certain cost control methods. expense reports contain information about the cash outlays in your company. This information will help you understand how much money your employees are spending and what they are spending it on. When you know where the money is going, you can evaluate your company’s financial health, calculate profits and losses, and analyze business efficiency. As your business grows and you need to process more transactions, you’ll want a scalable accounting solution. Save time on your business accounting with FreshBooks fast accounting software.

• An expense report contains a categorized and detailed list of costs incurred on behalf of the company.
• Having this information at your fingertips also allows you to better budget for those expenses, or perhaps cut down on travel if costs are excessive.
• Designed with transportation expenses in mind, this employee expense report with mileage template is perfect for tracking reimbursable miles or kilometers traveled.
• Just connect your data source (such as Google sheet with expense information), display your data any way you like, share your dashboard with others, or download it as a report.

If you want a flexible system that lets you make changes, automate submissions, and share documents with ease, then digital reporting is a no-brainer. With Asana, you can create a standard intake process that makes it easy to input expenses and deliver reimbursements. However, before using it, make sure your finance team approves the format and layout.

The next thing included in the expense report is the total of every expense and the total expense (including tax that the company pays). An expense report contains a categorized and detailed list of costs incurred on behalf of the company. 3) The expense report was not submitted during the expected time of submission.

For a blank, printable expense form that you can fill out by hand, simply remove the sample data and fill in the information you want printed. Mary Girsch-Bock is the expert on accounting software and payroll software for The Ascent. The central part of running a business is maintaining tax deductions and fillings. Try one of these free business budget templates for your organization’s budgeting needs.

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This printable mileage expense sheet can be used to record and calculate any miles accrued for business purposes. Enter the rate per mile and number of miles to calculate the total reimbursement amount. You can include odometer readings and any pertinent notes about the travel purpose or outcome.