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Expenses in Roubler – Overview for Payroll Administrators (by Payroll Engine)

Audience

This article is for payroll administrators, payroll managers, and finance users who:

  • Configure expense types, mileage rules, tax/VAT codes and mappings in Roubler.

  • Import and reconcile approved expense claims into payroll.
  • Work with one of the following payroll setups:
    • Employment Hero / KeyPay–backed payroll (Roubler‑native / EH payroll)
    • SimplePay (via integration)
    • Payspace (via integration)

Before you start

Before managing expenses from a payroll point of view:

  1. Know your payroll engine
    • Confirm whether your Roubler account is connected to:
      • Employment Hero / KeyPay payroll (direct, tight integration).

      • SimplePay via EST integration.

      • Payspace via EST integration (often labelled “Payspace phase II”).

  2. Check permissions and access
    • Your profile uses a payroll/finance‑level permission group that includes:
      • Payroll access; and

      • Expense permissions (e.g. Approve Expense Requests, which depends on Create & Update Expense Requests in the payroll bundle).

    • You have location access for the employees whose expenses you must process; primary location and reporting hierarchy drive who can see and approve expenses and receive notifications.

  3. Ensure Expenses is configured

    • Expense self‑service is enabled for employees who should submit claims (permission “View own employee expenses”).

    • Managers who approve expenses can access Payroll → Expenses and see their teams’ claims.

  4. Confirm expense types, tax/VAT, mileage rules, and mappings
    • Expense types (e.g. Travel, Mileage, Phone, Meals) are set up with:

      • Correct tax/VAT codes (where required by your payroll/accounting).

      • Mapping from each type to the appropriate pay item / GL account in the payroll engine or accounting system.

    • For mileage:
      • Tax year and mileage settings are configured in Company Settings → Workflows.

      • Mileage expense type has Calculated enabled so Roubler converts quantity (e.g. miles) × rate into an amount.

How Expenses work in Roubler (general)

Regardless of payroll engine, the in‑app expense workflow is broadly the same:

  1. Employees submit claims
    • From Expenses, employees submit claims with:
      • Date, type/category, amount, description

      • Optional coding (cost centre / project) and attached receipts.

  2. Managers approve / return / decline
    • Roubler routes claims to managers based on:
      • Employee’s primary location and managers at that location.

      • Any direct‑reports / reporting hierarchy and notification settings.

    • Managers approve, decline, or send back claims via Payroll → Expenses (or similar label).

  3. Payroll admins view and manage claims
    • From Payroll → Expenses you can:

      • View all submitted / pending / approved claims in your scope.

      • Edit claims pre‑approval for small corrections (per policy).

      • Add claims on behalf of employees and then approve them.

  4. Approved expenses reach payroll

    • Once a claim is Approved in Roubler, it becomes available to the connected payroll engine as a reimbursable expense line, subject to your integration setup.

    • After the pay run is imported/finalised and the engine confirms the line, the status typically updates to Paid / Reimbursed, and the employee may receive an “Expense request paid” email.

  5. Corrections to Approved / Paid claims

    • Approved/Paid expenses are generally locked from editing on the expense screen; any corrections must be handled via payroll adjustments (e.g. corrections in a future pay run), not by altering the Roubler claim only.

How expenses integrate – by payroll engine

1. Accounts connected to Employment Hero / KeyPay payroll

These accounts use Roubler with an Employment Hero/KeyPay‑style payroll engine (often branded Employment Hero Payroll, KeyPay, or EH).

Key behaviours

  • Automatic availability of approved expenses

    • Once a claim is Approved in Roubler, it is automatically made available in the connected payroll system as an expense line to be pulled into a pay run.

  • Import into pay run
    • In the EH/KeyPay pay run, you:

      • Use the Import expenses / equivalent step to bring in approved claims for that period.

      • Confirm that each expense appears under the relevant employee in the pay run.
  • “Expense request paid” emails

    • These emails mean the claim has been successfully sent to the payroll engine (and usually associated with a pay run), not necessarily that the bank payment has been completed at that exact moment.

Common EH/KeyPay‑related issues

  • Approved but not importing into pay run
    Typical causes:

    • Expense date outside the pay period.
    • Employee not included in that entity/pay run.
    • Expense type not mapped to a pay item.
    • Description too long or with invalid characters (generally > ~250 chars).

    Actions:

    • Check date vs pay period and employee inclusion.

    • Shorten description and re‑create the claim if needed; re‑approve and re‑import.

    • Review mapping of expense type → pay item; correct in payroll and re‑run the import.

  • Tax code / VAT mapping errors

    • Errors like “select an expense tax code” usually mean the pay item in the EH/KeyPay engine has no default tax code, not that Roubler settings are wrong.

    • Fix by:
      • Editing each expense pay item in payroll and assigning the correct tax/VAT code.

      • Refreshing or recreating the pay run so new codes apply.

  • “Paid” in Roubler but not actually paid

    • Treat “paid” in Roubler as “successfully handed to the payroll engine”; confirm inclusion and amount in the actual pay run and bank file; adjust in payroll if missed or duplicated.

2. Accounts integrated with SimplePay

These accounts use SimplePay as the payroll engine, with an external integration layer (commonly Expert Solution Technologies – EST).

High‑level flow

  1. Employees submit and managers approve expenses in Roubler.

  2. Integration jobs send expense‑related data (often grouped with other modules like PayRate or Leave) from Roubler to SimplePay.

  3. You then import or confirm those lines in SimplePay’s pay run, based on your mapping.

Monitoring integration

  • You may receive “Roubler Integration Update” emails showing:
    • Integration System = SimplePay
    • Module (e.g. PayRate, Leave)

    • Status and Reason for each record.

  • Failures here (even if not labelled “expense”) can signal issues that also affect expense flows.

Common SimplePay‑related issues

  • Records failing due to mapping errors

    • Errors such as “does not map serviceKey from Roubler to SimplePay” on PayRate or other modules indicate mapping gaps and can similarly affect expense mapping.

    • Fix inside SimplePay (and, if applicable, the integration platform) by:
      • Ensuring corresponding accounts/items exist and are correctly mapped.
  • Approved expenses not visible in SimplePay pay run
    Use the same checks as EH/KeyPay:
    • Date within pay period.
    • Employee included in that pay run.
    • Expense type mapped to a SimplePay pay item with valid tax code.

    • Description length and characters within acceptable limits (see EH/KeyPay section).

  • Integration emails show repeated SimplePay errors

    • For example, repeated “serviceKey” or configuration errors in Roubler Integration Update emails.

    • Coordinate with:
      • Your internal payroll/finance team; and
      • SimplePay / EST or MYOB/Roubler support as appropriate, providing full email contents and examples.

3. Accounts integrated with Payspace

These accounts use Payspace, typically via the same EST integration layer used for SimplePay.

High‑level flow

  1. Expenses are approved in Roubler.
  2. Integration runs (often under “Payspace phase II” or similar) push data into Payspace for the relevant module.
  3. Payspace makes the data available as reimbursements or allowances in pay runs.

Common Payspace‑related issues

  • Access token failures blocking all integration traffic

    Example error in Roubler Integration Update emails:

    “Error occurred in Payspace Access token, Please reconnect Payspace company to proceed further.”

    • Action:
      • Reconnect the Payspace company / refresh credentials in the integration configuration.
      • Once reconnected, re‑run the affected integration jobs and re‑import into your pay run.
  • Data mapping / module failures

    • Similar to SimplePay, any unconfigured or mismatched mappings for expense‑related items in Payspace or the integration platform can stop expense data from appearing in pay runs even if it is “Approved” in Roubler.

What to check

  • Roubler side: Approval status, date, employee, and expense type.
  • Integration layer: Roubler Integration Update emails/logs for Payspace entries and reasons for failure.
  • Payspace side: Existence and configuration of corresponding earnings/allowance categories and any necessary tax codes or GL links.

Frequently asked questions and troubleshooting

1. Approved in Roubler, missing from pay run

Applies to all engines (EH/KeyPay, SimplePay, Payspace):

  • Check:

    • Expense date vs pay period.

    • Employee is included in that pay entity/pay group.

    • Expense type mapped to a pay item in the payroll engine; mappings and tax/VAT codes set.

    • Description length/characters; keep under ~250 characters and avoid unusual symbols.

  • For SimplePay and Payspace, also check:

    • Latest Roubler Integration Update email/logs for failures affecting that company and module.

2. Expense shows as “Paid” but employee was not reimbursed

Applies especially to EH/KeyPay‑backed accounts:

  • “Expense request paid” email = Roubler successfully sent the claim to the payroll engine, not necessarily that banking has occurred.

Steps:

  1. Identify which pay run should contain the expense and confirm the line.

  2. If missing or incorrect, handle via your normal payroll adjustment process (e.g. add in next run or correct the line), not by editing the Roubler expense only.

3. Expense paid twice

  • Often occurs when expenses are:

    • Imported via Roubler and also keyed manually into the pay run or accounting system.

Action:

  1. Treat one payment as an overpayment and recover or correct it via your normal payroll process (negative adjustment or manual recovery).
  2. Standardise on a single process:

    • Prefer end‑to‑end Roubler expense management, allowing the integration to control what is re‑imported and marked as paid.

4. Integration emails show repeated errors (SimplePay / Payspace)

  • Roubler Integration Update emails list failures per:

    • Integration System, Company, Module, Date/Time, and Reason.

Typical patterns:

  • Payspace – access token errors requiring reconnection.

  • SimplePay – serviceKey or mapping errors for certain modules (e.g. PayRate), indicating account or pay item mapping gaps.

Action:

  • Use errors in these emails to:
    • Identify whether the integration actually attempted to send the relevant employee’s data.
    • Decide whether remediation is required in:
      • The payroll system (pay item/tax/mapping config).
      • The integration platform (credentials, endpoints, mappings).

Who to contact for help

  1. Internal payroll / HR / finance
    • First line for:

      • Payment timing, over/under‑payments, corrections, taxable vs non‑taxable treatment, and internal policy decisions.

  2. Internal Roubler/system administrator or IT
    • For:

      • Permissions, location access, and visibility issues (e.g. missing Payroll → Expenses, employees not seeing Expenses in their menu).

      • Setup and maintenance of expense types, mileage rules, tax/VAT codes, and mapping to pay items / chart of accounts.

      • Understanding how approvals, notifications, and reporting hierarchy drive who sees which expenses.

  3. Roubler / MYOB Support (vendor)

    • Should only be contacted by authorised internal admins, not by individual employees.

    • Escalate when:
      • You have validated configuration and still see unexpected behaviour (e.g. approved expenses consistently not reaching the engine despite correct mappings and dates).

      • There appear to be system issues with integrations to Employment Hero/KeyPay, SimplePay, or Payspace (e.g. persistent access‑token errors or unexplained import failures).

When raising a ticket (internally or with Roubler Support), always include:

  • Company name and environment.
  • Payroll engine (EH/KeyPay, SimplePay, or Payspace).
  • Example employee(s), expense ID(s), dates, and amounts.
  • Screenshots of:
    • The expense in Roubler (including status and type).
    • The Payroll → Expenses page.
    • The pay run (before and after Import expenses).
    • Any Roubler Integration Update email entries related to the issue.

This detail significantly reduces investigation time and helps keep expense reimbursements accurate across Roubler and your chosen payroll engine.