4 ms·

This is not me blaming the victim. He totally shouldn't have to worry about what I am about to say. If he was ordering for himself, my advice wouldn't apply. I

This is not me blaming the victim. He totally shouldn't have to worry about what I am about to say. If he was ordering for himself, my advice wouldn't apply. If you are ordering something for your work, use a work credit card and have it delivered to your work address. I never put myself (or my finances) out there for my work. I've had people ask me to pick up snacks for meetings and say I can just expense it later. Sorry...not happening. Someone decides they don't want to approve the expense and I'm holding the bill. Either give me a work credit card or figure out another way to order your stuff.

Zenst 3y ago
I can vouch for that advice and equally double check. My story - I worked for a Canadian company Blackberry in the UK and they wanted me to go to the Seattle office for few weeks. I said I couldn't afford to be covering expenses and my manager said would sort that out, came along with a bit of paper saying was expense advance - sign that. Well, turns out he lied, was pay advance as I found out when I got paid say 12 hours TZ difference from my bank etc when my rent, council tax and everything bounced. So I'm on the other side of the World and chaos is starting to rain on my home back home. Now was a Canadian also there for a few weeks and not only had he got a proper expense advance, was 3x what I got (yes I was underpaid and that's another story) and was shocked how my boss messed up. Long story short, they never fixed the mess and caused me to have a breakdown, never did get my expenses back, lost my home and ended up with a massive council tax bill that took me years paying off and life went very downhill from there afterwards from one surreal predicament to another. So do remind your companies that you are not a bank, you are already working in areas for the company and never ever pay for expense stuff from your own money unless you can charge interest and penalty clauses for late paying.
- ipaddr 3y ago
  Never agree to travel without them sending a plane ticket prepaid first.
  - Zenst 3y ago
    Oh I had that, just stitched up with salary advance instead of expense advance.
jpambrun 3y ago
Even with a corporate credit card you are usually personally responsible until the expense is approved.
- happyopossum 3y ago
  That depends on the card and how you acquired it. A corporate Amex is typically backed by the employee, but they are falling out of favor in part because of that. If you have a corporate card through a bank other than Amex, there’s a very good chance you do not carry the liability for paying it. Your employer could come after you if they feel it was used improperly, but that’s a very different can of worms than carrying credit liability.
NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
I don't know how it works for First Nations bands, but from my perspective as a long-time church volunteer, we're often expected to make use of our personal resources for our volunteer roles. We pay out of pocket for supplies and stuff, we're driving personal cars, there's not a lot of guidance about how to structure our email or other online accounts. The church is certainly never going to give us a church-owned computer to do stuff on, or a church credit card to rack up expenses. We may get reimbursed, or we may be out of pocket as a "donation" to support these ministries. It's one of the most difficult things about being a church volunteer, for me. I finally got wise on the account front, and I've created accounts which are totally separate and dedicated to doing only church volunteer activities, so that it's not mixed in with my personal activity or data. And in terms of USB thumb drives or something, I can purchase separate ones. But when it comes down to capital expenses and such, we seldom have a choice but to mingle our personal lives with those volunteer roles.

Zenst 3y ago

I can vouch for that advice and equally double check. My story - I worked for a Canadian company Blackberry in the UK and they wanted me to go to the Seattle office for few weeks. I said I couldn't afford to be covering expenses and my manager said would sort that out, came along with a bit of paper saying was expense advance - sign that. Well, turns out he lied, was pay advance as I found out when I got paid say 12 hours TZ difference from my bank etc when my rent, council tax and everything bounced. So I'm on the other side of the World and chaos is starting to rain on my home back home. Now was a Canadian also there for a few weeks and not only had he got a proper expense advance, was 3x what I got (yes I was underpaid and that's another story) and was shocked how my boss messed up. Long story short, they never fixed the mess and caused me to have a breakdown, never did get my expenses back, lost my home and ended up with a massive council tax bill that took me years paying off and life went very downhill from there afterwards from one surreal predicament to another. So do remind your companies that you are not a bank, you are already working in areas for the company and never ever pay for expense stuff from your own money unless you can charge interest and penalty clauses for late paying.

ipaddr 3y ago
Never agree to travel without them sending a plane ticket prepaid first.
- Zenst 3y ago
  Oh I had that, just stitched up with salary advance instead of expense advance.

jpambrun 3y ago

Even with a corporate credit card you are usually personally responsible until the expense is approved.

happyopossum 3y ago
That depends on the card and how you acquired it. A corporate Amex is typically backed by the employee, but they are falling out of favor in part because of that. If you have a corporate card through a bank other than Amex, there’s a very good chance you do not carry the liability for paying it. Your employer could come after you if they feel it was used improperly, but that’s a very different can of worms than carrying credit liability.

NoZebra120vClip 3y ago

I don't know how it works for First Nations bands, but from my perspective as a long-time church volunteer, we're often expected to make use of our personal resources for our volunteer roles. We pay out of pocket for supplies and stuff, we're driving personal cars, there's not a lot of guidance about how to structure our email or other online accounts. The church is certainly never going to give us a church-owned computer to do stuff on, or a church credit card to rack up expenses. We may get reimbursed, or we may be out of pocket as a "donation" to support these ministries. It's one of the most difficult things about being a church volunteer, for me. I finally got wise on the account front, and I've created accounts which are totally separate and dedicated to doing only church volunteer activities, so that it's not mixed in with my personal activity or data. And in terms of USB thumb drives or something, I can purchase separate ones. But when it comes down to capital expenses and such, we seldom have a choice but to mingle our personal lives with those volunteer roles.