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Travel Department News

bullet Electronic Attachment Announcement Updated 8/5/08
bullet Flood 2008 - Department Information
bullet Meal Guidelines - New!
bullet New Eastern Iowa Airport Parking Discount
bullet Mileage Rate Increase
bullet Travel Policy Changes
bullet International Travel Tips-New Visa requirements; vaccination information
bullet Business Purpose Requirement on ProTrav
bullet Upper Level Report/Review Now Available in ProTrav 
bullet Hackers are sneaky threats for wireless-network users (article)
bullet ProTrav/PCard Attachments Training
bullet Rental Car Update Memo Important!
bullet New UI Vehicle Rental Policy
bullet Purchase of Airline Tickets
bullet New Release for ProTrav Non-UI Acknowledgement Form
bullet Responsibility of an Approver
bullet Cash Advance Policy Reminder
bullet US Sales Tax and Use Tax Exemptions
bullet Sign up for Travel Tips via LISTSERV
General Travel News
bullet Air travel’s new do's and don'ts
USA Today, 8/11/2006
bullet Current CNN Travel News
bullet Current Eastern Iowa Airport News
bullet BTN
bullet National Business Travel Association
   
Federal  Government Travel News
bullet New Requirements for Travel to/from Canada, Mexico & Caribbean
bullet Permitted and Prohibited Items
bullet Travel Preparation--Clearing Security
bullet FAA Flight Delay Data
bullet US Dept of State Travel Information
bullet Current FAA Travel News
bullet US Department of State Travel Warnings & Consular Information Sheets

Meal Guidelines - New!

  • Actual meal expenses should be claimed and may not exceed the daily allowance for each destination.
  • International and domestic out of state meal allowances are based upon federal government guidelines, except that the UI allowances are never less than $40/day for out of state locations.  Meal allowance for the travel within the state of Iowa is $31/day.  All rates are available on the Domestic Travel Web Page.
  • Meal tips should be included in the meal claim and may not be claimed as a separate expense. 
  • Claims up to the full maximum are allowed on full days of travel
  • On partial days of travel, allowances are prorated based upon departure and return times as defined below, allowing 20 % of the daily allowance for breakfast, 30% for lunch, and 50% for dinner. These individual allotments are defined for the purpose of determining the correct daily allowance only.  Individual meal claims do not have to fall within these specific meal parameters.   Actual costs can be distributed among the meals in any manner as long as the total claim for each day does not exceed the maximum allowance for that day.
  • Meal costs over the maximum allowance are at the traveler’s expense.
  • Alcohol is not a reimbursable travel expense.
  • Attach a receipt for any individual meal claim of $75 or more.

Mileage Rate Increase

In keeping with the Federal Government GSA reimbursement rates, the University’s mileage reimbursement rate of .505/mile will be raised to .585, effective 8/1/2008.  The Federal GSA and University reimbursement rate of .285 is not changing at this time.   The .285 rate is applicable for trips of more than 100 miles if the traveler chooses to use a personal vehicle when a motor pool vehicle was available.

The correct rates will default into your Travel expense voucher in ProTrav based upon your dates of travel and miles traveled.  The applicable mileage rates for various dates of travel may also be viewed on the travel website www.uiowa.edu/~fustd/travel/Domestic%20Travel/domestic_travel.htm#Mileage.

Questions regarding this policy change may be directed to protrav@uiowa.edu.

The following travel policy changes have been approved and are effective immediately:

Receipt Requirement Raised

The receipt requirement threshold is increased to $75 for all travel expenses except airfare, rental car, hotel, train, and conference registration. This applies to domestic and international travel. An electronic or paper receipt is always required for these specific expenses, regardless of the cost. When business meals are claimed on a travel voucher, all of the requirements, documentation, and justifications outlined in the Food and Beverage policy still apply even if the expense is below the receipt requirement.

Hotel Allowances Raised

The university’s maximum allowance for hotels for domestic travel is: a) the conference site/headquarter hotel rate; b) another hotel equal to or less than the conference hotel; or c) up to 200% of the federal government allowance for the specified destination.

Questions may be directed to any of the following contacts:

International Travel Tips-New Visa requirements; vaccination information

The following information is provided to help you prepare in advance for your next business or personal travel outside the United States.

New Visa Requirements

Beginning on January 8, 2007, ALL persons, including U.S. citizens, traveling by air between the United States and Canada, Mexico, Central and South America, the Caribbean, and Bermuda will be required to present a valid passport, Air NEXUS card, or U.S. Coast Guard Merchant Mariner Document.

For more complete information on US government document requirements for international travel please refer to the following websites:

Health Requirements/Information

Information about health risks associated with travel to specific destinations and about immunizations that are required or recommended is available at the websites provided below. This information and that provided by University travel agencies is provided as a guideline only, and to inform you of government requirements. Please remember to consult your own health care provider for the most up to date information about the exact location to which you are traveling and for recommendations specific to your individual health care needs.

If you wish to have one place bookmarked for all of this information, it is posted on the University of Iowa Travel Page under the International Travel Link.

Questions or comments may be directed to becky-schaffner@uiowa.edu.

Upper Level Report/Review Now Available in ProTrav:

ProTrav offers an “Upper Level” role to facilitate administrative review of Procurement Card and Travel related expenses. Reviews can be done at a cardholder, traveler, department or organizational level. Individual with budgetary responsibilities, Deans, Directors, Department heads, and other supervisory staff could likely benefit from this type of access to travel and pcard data. If you or others in your department could use this type of information to better perform your job duties, please complete the access request form.

For more information about this role click here or contact protrav@uiowa.edu with questions.


Purchase of Airline Tickets

The University Procurement Card should only be used to purchase tickets for University employees and/or for individuals that are traveling on behalf of the University. It may not be used to purchase tickets for family members accompanying University business travelers. Because this is a personal expense, such a purchase is considered misuse of the card.

The cardholder agreement states: “The cardholder may not make personal charges on the card. Personal expenses processed on The University of Iowa Procurement Card are in violation of the Procurement Card guidelines. Flagrant misuse may result in payroll deduction, card revocation and the Cardholder’s termination.”

The payroll deduct function should only be used when reimbursement for an expenses has been received from a third party and for deduction of expenses that are disallowed by the department or policy. Repeated purchases of “disallowed” charges are also considered misuse of the card. The payroll deduct feature should never be used as a tool to allow personal or disallowed expenses on the procurement card.

Your procurement card should be kept on campus in a secured location except when you are in travel status or making University purchases at a local merchant. You should keep the card in a secured place instead of in your billfold or purse to prevent the mistaken use of the card for personal purchases. Stating that a cardholder provided the wrong card when making a purchase is not a justifiable reason for misuse of the card or payroll deduct feature. Repeated occurrences may result in the revocation of the card.

If you have questions or comments about this announcement, please contact Sherri Dusenbery directly at sherri-dusenbery@uiowa.edu.

New Release for ProTrav Non-UI Acknowledgement Form

ProTrav now offers three options for obtaining a Non UI traveler’s signature, or approval, of travel expenses:

  • Send an email to the traveler. Click the “send to traveler for review” button, enter the traveler’s email and wait for the traveler’s email response.
  • Print the Acknowledgement of Expense Form from the link provided (either at the completion of the TEV or from the ProTrav sidebar) and have the traveler complete and sign.
  • Send an email to yourself. Click on “Submit to Traveler” button and enter your own email address. Then print the form that is created and send it to the traveler via mail or fax for their signature, or have the traveler sign it in person while they are here.

Regardless of which method you choose, you must attach the traveler’s signature/approval to the TEV cover sheet and send along with any required receipts to the Travel Office, 202 PCO. You must also go back into the TEV and click on the “Submit to Workflow” button to route for your department’s approval and send on to the Travel office for processing.

 

Cash Advance Policy Reminder

With summer approaching and plans being made for scholarly summer travel, the Travel Office would like to remind you of current University cash advance policy:

  • “Prepaid” advances for airfare and hotel deposits charged to personal credit cards are not allowed. These expenses should be charged to Departmental or individual UI Procurement Cards. If a traveler chooses to use a personal card for such purchases, they must wait until after the trip is over to be reimbursed.
  • Standard cash advances are limited to UI students and employees earning less than $50,000. UI employees earning more than $50,000 may obtain cash advances only for foreign travel and/or for domestic travel exceeding 14 days.
  • Cash advances for non-UI persons traveling on UI business should be limited to food allowances for the specified number of days of travel only. These should be requested only in special circumstances where the individual has no other reasonable means to cover these costs. All other expenses such as airfare, hotel, shuttle service, etc should be paid directly to the vendor via the Procurement Card or E-voucher.

Please forward this information to all travelers in your department. It is particularly important to get this information to graduate students who have upcoming travel, as they may be unfamiliar with UI travel policy and payment options. Please provide them with the information necessary to purchase their airfare with departmental procurement cards. If you have questions please email becky-schaffner@uiowa.edu

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LISTSERV-Travel Tips

Instructions for signing up for Travel-Tips:

  1. Address an e-mail message to listserv@list.uiowa.edu
  2. Put the following in the body of the message:
    subscribe travel-tips yourfirstname yourlastname

A confirmation message will be sent to your e-mail address asking you to confirm your subscription request. You must reply to this message with ok in the body of the message. Leave the subject unchanged.

 

 

 

 

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