Hotel Itemization in new Expense UI - flexibility for customization?

[malgeni]

We’ve been seeking changes to the hotel itemization for a long time, so thank you for your attention to it.  I’m hoping that, with the new UI, there will be customization flexibility as well?  Below are some things I’d like to do, and am wondering if they would be possible in the new UI:

 1.  Can the Admin make the hotel itemization optional for the user? Now that check in/out dates and number of nights are in the Details tab (thank you!), we only need itemization if there are extra expenses on the hotel bill such as meals, personal charges, etc. We don’t need to separate the tax, and we can calculate the average nightly rate in reports.  I’d love our users to be able to skip the whole itemization experience 90% of the time, but have it available for those extras if needed.

2.  Will Admins have the ability to limit/change the Expense Types available in the hotel itemization dropdown? “Airfare” and many more of our expense types will never be needed in hotel itemization. I’d like to eliminate the clutter but be able to add an expense type upon request if suddenly needed.

3.  Can we set the country to default in the City field (Details tab)? 99.999% of our travel is within the US, so it would be great if our users could skip that step, but still have it changeable if needed.

Thanks, and I like this new forum much better!

[Jody · Accepted solution]

@malgeni! Clearly, you want to make things easier for your employees and we want to help.

Spoiler

None of the answers below have to do with the new user interface (UI).

Assuming you're using Concur Professional, the short answer to all three of your questions is: call us! Concur support can update your configuration to:

1. Make hotel itemization optional.

2. Limit the available expense types available (for hotel itemization).

3. Include the country field on the expense form – this can default to the country from the user's profile. (Then they only need to modify it if they are traveling.)  

What else? 

[MommaSnow4]

This is awesome information.  Never knew we could limit expense types for hotel itemizations.

[GrantC]

To add some additional details about itemization:

Itemization for most expense types can be set to required, never allowed, or optional. Exceptions to this include "special" expense types such as mileage, fixed meals, and cash advance related items.

For all expense types where itemization is set to required or optional it is possible to limit the expense types available during the itemization process.

Itemization wizards can be created to help assist users itemize things that are itemized frequently that are not hotels. Separating alcohol or tips on a meal is a common example.

To answer the most common question about itemization: sadly, no, the hotel itemization form cannot be modified.