1. Employee Conference Or Meeting Reimbursement

Over the past few months there have been requests for additional clarification of what meets the UW business purpose and benefit justification policy that was put in place recently. This document includes general examples of acceptable business purpose and UW benefit justifications for different types of reimbursements. This is intended to provide examples of what type of information is required but these are basic examples as we cannot cover all situations in a document like this. This document does NOT supersede the UW policies. If you have other circumstances, such as personal time added to a trip to a conference or requesting reimbursement for additional day of lodging for a speaker, you need to include the additional information required for those situations. You should always refer to the policy documentation on the accounting services site (http://www.bussvc.wisc.edu/acct/travel/index.html) or you can contact Carla Fischer or Cindy Armour if you have questions.

1. Employee Conference or Meeting Reimbursement:

a. Required to include:

a.i. Name of Conference or meeting

a.ii. Date(s) of conference or meeting (separate from the dates of travel which is in another section)

a.iii. Indicate the business reason for attending and the benefit to the University

a.iv. If you added personal time to your travel, a cost comparison is required at the time of purchase to show the cost of only the conference travel and the cost with the personal time added

b. Justification and Business Purpose Examples

b.i. Attended the 14th Annual Vision Sciences Society meeting held at ABC Hotel at St Pete Beach, FL from May 16-21, 2014. I presented a poster there and learned new progresses/information in the field of glaucoma. This is beneficial to our glaucoma research at the University, enabling us to bring research dollars into the UW.

b.ii. I traveled to Washington DC October 13-17, 2014 to attend a meeting at the Institute of Medicine. The meeting focused on evaluation of community health improvement efforts, a key component of the Healthy America program. It was an opportunity to network with leading researchers on this topic and to share our work with other leaders on this topic.

b.iii. I went to La Crosse with the Division of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services staff and Mental Health Council members to learn about the behavioral health services in La Crosse and surrounding counties. The university benefits from this because I will better able to develop and provide trainings to providers in rural parts of the state and understand their needs, which then benefits the mental health consumers in the state.

2. Guest Speaker Travel a. Required to include:

a.i. Date of presentation

a.ii. Presentation name

b. Justification and Business Purpose Example:

b.i. Dr. Jones from Ohio University traveled to Madison to give a talk for the Biological Imaging Series titled "Neuronal Ensembles: An Emergent Level of Cortical Function" at 4:00 p.m., Sept 29, 2014.

3. Mileage:

a.i. Include to and from building locations, not just the city.

a.ii. Claim actual round trip mileage and have a printout of a map search program showing the addresses and mileage

b. Justification and Business Purpose Example:

b.i. Required all-staff meeting for the XYZ Program Quarterly Staff Meeting held at the Americinn in Plover, WI on September 16, 2014. Left from the HSLC office to go to the Americinn.

4. Hosted Meal at Meeting:

a.i. Interview candidates:

a.i.1. Include the PVL

a.ii. Hosted meal – UW staff only:

a.ii.1. Items of business being discussed (prefer 2 items)

a.ii.2. Business purpose

a.ii.3. Reason why meeting had to occur over a meal

a.iii. Hosted meal – UW and non-UW staff:

a.iii.1. 2-3 items from the agenda

a.iii.2. Business purpose

b. Examples b.i. Went to Steenbock’s on June 1 for dinner with the chair candidate for the department of X and two other chair selection committee members to discuss the research interests of this candidate. PVL #12345.

b.ii. Reimbursement for meal and beverages purchased for lunch and to be available for breaks for the External Advisory Committee meeting for the X Research Center at the Fluno Center from 7:30 to 3:00 on October 13, 2014. The granting agency requires annual site visits from this advisory committee to retain the funding. b.iii. Dinner served at the XYZ Board of Directors quarterly meeting on Oct 6, 2014, at Otto’s in a private room, 6 pm – 8:30 pm. UW business discussed was review of quarterly financials, review of new award proposals and set up strategic plan for upcoming year. Attendees were from all over the South East WI area so meeting was scheduled off campus in a central location easily available to all attendees.