Classic form

Expense claim form

Expense claims come back for boring reasons: a missing receipt, a date outside the window, or fuel claimed on top of a kilometre rate. This claim states each of those rules in the block where it applies, and gives the line items a table with six rows so a normal trip fits without an attachment. It is a classic form, because a claim is checked as a whole and a receipt upload has to sit beside the lines it belongs to.

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Welcome screen of the expense claim form example — The welcome screen respondents see first. The image was generated for this example.

The form itself

A static copy of the finished form, exactly as it renders. Nothing here can be filled in or submitted, so read it as a reference and build your own from the button above.

Expense claim

For money you have already spent out of your own pocket. Claims approved by the 20th are paid with that month's pay run; anything after that waits for the next one.

You and the claim

Your name *

First

Last

Employee number *

Cost centre *

Approver's email *

Client or project, if this is billable

What you spent

One line per receipt, dated the day the money left your account rather than the day of the trip. Amounts are what you actually paid, including tax. Claims are accepted for sixty days after the spend and not after that, which is the rule that catches almost everybody at least once.

Line items

#	Date	What it was	Category	Amount paid
1
2
3
4
5
6

Total claimed *

Was any of it paid in another currency? *

Yes, and I have claimed the amount my bank charged me

Receipts

Every line above needs a receipt, and a card statement is not one, because it does not come from the supplier. A receipt has to show the supplier, the date, what was bought and the amount. Anything over $82.50 including tax needs a proper tax invoice rather than an eftpos slip, because that is the threshold at which the company can claim the tax back.

Your receipts *

Click to upload

Max: 10MB

Up to ten files, PDF or photo, 10 MB each. Photograph receipts flat on a dark surface with the whole docket in frame. A folded receipt with the total cropped off is the single most common reason a claim comes back.

Your own car, if you used it

Kilometres in your own vehicle are paid at the published cents per kilometre rate and do not need a receipt, but they do need a route and a reason. The rate already covers fuel, servicing, insurance and wear, so fuel bought for your own car cannot be claimed on top of it, and there is an annual ceiling of 5,000 work kilometres per car.

Does this claim include travel in your own vehicle? *

Yes, and the trips are below

Trips in your own vehicle

#	Date	From and to	Reason	Kilometres
1
2
3

Declaration

Finance reads the claim after your approver has, not before. If a line is queried it comes back to you rather than being quietly removed, so a claim that seems slow is usually a claim somebody is trying to pay.

I declare *

Every line was spent on company business and none of it is personal

I have not claimed any of this before and will not claim it anywhere else

A receipt is attached for every line, and each one shows the supplier, the date and the amount

Nothing here has been or will be reimbursed by a client directly

None of these lines was paid on a company card

Every field, and what it collects

The complete field list, in the order respondents meet it.

Your nameNameRequired
Employee numberShort textRequired
Cost centreDropdownRequired: Options: Delivery · Sales · Marketing · Operations · Finance and legal · People and culture · A client project, named below
Approver's emailShort textRequired
Client or project, if this is billableShort text
Line itemsTable: Columns: Date · What it was · Category · Amount paid
Total claimedNumberRequired
Was any of it paid in another currency?Single choiceRequired: Options: No · Yes, and I have claimed the amount my bank charged me
Your receiptsFile uploadRequired: Up to ten files, PDF or photo, 10 MB each. Photograph receipts flat on a dark surface with the whole docket in frame. A folded receipt with the total cropped off is the single most common reason a claim comes back.
Does this claim include travel in your own vehicle?Single choiceRequired: Options: No · Yes, and the trips are below
Trips in your own vehicleTable: Columns: Date · From and to · Reason · Kilometres
I declareMultiple choiceRequired: Options: Every line was spent on company business and none of it is personal · I have not claimed any of this before and will not claim it anywhere else · A receipt is attached for every line, and each one shows the supplier, the date and the amount · Nothing here has been or will be reimbursed by a client directly · None of these lines was paid on a company card

What makes this form work

Each rule sits in the block it governs

The sixty day window is above the line items, the receipt definition is above the upload, and the fuel rule is above the mileage table. A claimant meets each rule at the moment it applies to them, which is the only version of a policy anybody reads.

The receipt upload teaches people how to photograph a docket

Flat, dark surface, whole docket in frame. A file upload is one of only two fields whose description a classic form actually shows a respondent, so this is the one place that advice can live and be seen. It removes the most common reason a claim is returned.

The mileage table asks for a reason, not just kilometres

Date, route, reason, kilometres. The reason column is what makes the claim reviewable months later, and it is the difference between a mileage claim that survives a check and a number nobody can account for.

Questions people ask

How many line items should an expense form allow?

As many rows as a normal claim needs, decided when the form is built. A table renders exactly the number of rows it was given and there is no add row button, so six is a design decision: it covers a two night trip, and anything bigger goes in as a second claim. Guessing high leaves a page of empty rows on every claim.

Does the form add up the line items?

No. There is no calculation between fields, which is why the total is its own number field and the claimant types it. That is worth knowing rather than working around: the total and the lines are checked against each other by whoever approves, and a mismatch is a useful signal rather than a bug.

How do the table rows come out in the export?

As one column holding the filled rows as JSON, not as four spreadsheet columns. The same is true of the mileage table. For reading a single claim in the responses table that is fine; for building a finance report from a whole month it means a parsing step, and the page says so rather than promising a tidy spreadsheet.

How many receipts can be attached?

This field takes ten files, up to 10 MB each, as PDFs or photos. A file upload can be set anywhere from one to ten files and up to 100 MB each, and the only two file types available are images and PDF. A phone photo of a paper docket is the normal case and it is what the field description is written for.

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