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Review Employee expense requests and respond

Audience

This article is for managers and supervisors who use Roubler to review employee expense requests and need to approve, decline, or send them back for correction.

Description

Employees submit expense claims in Roubler with date, type/category, amount, description and receipts. Roubler then:

  • Routes each claim to the appropriate manager(s) based on the employee’s primary location and manager-level access.

  • Lets managers review the details and either approve, decline, or return the claim.

Approved expenses flow to Payroll according to your organisation’s payroll setup.

Steps

1. Before you review expenses

Confirm that:

  • You understand your organisation’s Expense Policy (what can/can’t be claimed, documentation rules, limits).

  • Your permission group includes access to expenses (for example a Manager/Manager with Finance or similar role).

2. Open the expense review screen

  1. Log in to Roubler web.

  2. Go to the Expenses area (often under Payroll → Expenses or a similar menu, depending on your account).
     

  3. change the Grouping to group by Status. 

Each row will usually show:

  • Employee name.
  • Expense type/category.
  • Date and amount.

  • Status (Submitted / Pending, Approved, Returned/Declined, Paid – depending on setup).

3. Review an individual expense request

  1. Click an expense line to open the full details.

  2. Check against policy:

    • Date and amount.
    • Type/category and any coding (e.g. cost centre, project).
    • Description explaining the business purpose.
    • Receipts/attachments are present and legible where required.

  3. If something is unclear, you may be able to edit minor fields (if policy allows) or send back/decline and ask the employee to correct it.

4. Respond to the request (approve, decline, or return)

From the expense details screen:

  • Approve the claim:
    1. Click Approve.
    2. (Optional) Add a note for audit (e.g. cost centre, business justification).
    3. The status changes to Approved, and the claim becomes available for Payroll in the next pay run/export.
  • Decline/Reject the claim:
    1. Click Decline or Reject.
    2. Enter a clear reason (e.g. “Outside policy”, “Missing receipt”).
    3. The employee can see that the expense was declined and your comment.

Follow your internal policy on when to decline outright vs send back for edits.

Troubleshooting

1. “I can’t see any expense requests, but staff say they submitted them.”

Checks:

  • Confirm the employee’s primary location is one where you have manager-level permissions; expenses route to managers based on this.
  • Make sure you’re looking at the correct status filter (e.g. Submitted/Pending, not Approved only).
  • Ask Payroll or your internal Roubler administrator to confirm your permissions for expenses.

If another manager is configured as their approver, the request may be going to them instead.

2. “Too many managers are getting notifications about the same expenses.”

This usually means multiple managers have manager-level access to that employee’s primary location or approval chain.

  • Raise this with HR/Payroll or your internal Roubler administrator so they can:
    • Adjust reporting hierarchy or location access.
    • Refine which roles receive expense notifications.

3. “An expense is Approved in Roubler but not appearing in the pay run.”

Likely causes:

  • Payroll hasn’t pulled the latest approved expenses into the pay run yet.
  • Mapping between expense types and payroll items/GL codes is incomplete.

Manager actions:

  • Confirm in Roubler that the expense has Approved status.
  • Provide Payroll with:
    • Employee, date, amount and type.
    • Screenshots of the Roubler expense record.

Payroll/Finance can then check the pay run and mapping in the payroll engine.

Who to contact for help

If you still need help after following this guide:

HR / Payroll / Finance team

Contact HR/Payroll/Finance for:

  • Clarification on expense policy, acceptable edits, and approval limits.

  • Issues where expenses are Approved in Roubler but not paid or not appearing in payroll reports.

Internal Roubler/system administrator or IT/support

Contact your internal Roubler admin/support team for:

  • Problems with expense permissions or visibility (e.g. managers not seeing the right claims).
  • Integration or mapping issues between Roubler expenses and the payroll engine identified by Payroll.

  • General questions on how your Roubler environment is configured for expenses.

Your internal teams will investigate and, if needed, escalate to Roubler/MYOB Support on behalf of your organisation.