Submitting an Expense Report
To get started open your web browser and go to Paycor.com, login, and navigate to Expense Management.
- Click on the 3 gray lines in the upper left by the Paycor logo.
- Click on Pay, then Expense Management.
The Dashboard will appear.
- To start a new expense reimbursement click Add Expense Report.
- Enter a name for the expense report. Example: Akron Conference - Tom Artist.
- Enter a description of the report. Example: Expense Reimbursements 3/16 - 3/31/26
Now you will begin to add your Expense Items. Many Expense Items can be added to one Expense Report. Please note: if you are submitting expenses for a conference or travel please add all Expense Items to a single Expense Report for that trip so that all meals appear on one report. Reminder that meal reimbursements when traveling should not exceed $60/day + tax + tip. Alcohol is prohibited unless the President has given prior approval.
There are multiple ways you can add an Expense Item. You can manually type the details in the appropriate fields (date, category, vendor name, amount, notes). Or you can click on Attach and Scan Receipts and upload a new receipt to your receipt gallery, or click on receipt gallery and choose a receipt you have already saved to begin. If you are using a photograph of the receipt the optical character recognition (OCR) will populate the Date, Vendor Name, and Amount fields for you. You will be asked to confirm the data the OCR populates is correct. If you are using a PDF of a receipt the OCR won't automatically populate those fields so you will type them in. All Expense Items require a receipt or you will receive an error message when you attempt to save the report.
The "Reimbursable Expense" box will be automatically checked. If the expense is reimbursable then leave the check mark on the box. If the expense is a CIA credit card charge, and not a reimbursable expense, uncheck the box.
Add a note! The note field is important to add any clarifying details on an Expense Item. Any project codes used on the Expense Item should be referenced in this Notes box.
If your purchase is a Next Fiscal Year (NFY) purchase, you will need to indicate that in the notes field.
If you haven't attached the receipt yet, attach it now.
Save item.
After you hit save item, if you forget to attach a receipt the Expense Item will have a red exclamation mark and you will receive the following error message.
Once your expense report is submitted it is now sent to your supervisor for their approval. If your expense report is denied you will receive an email notification. Within the email body is a link to go to your expense report and review the details. You can make changes to the report, and resubmit. Once approved you will receive an email notification that your expense report was approved.
After the first approval step is completed it will now move to a Business Affairs review, and the AP Administer will also approve (or deny) your expense report. Once this final approval is done you will receive a second email that your Expense Report is fully approved, and your expense report will move to the queue to be paid via direct deposit through Paycor. Reimbursements will be paid out on Fridays. All expense reports that have received the final approval by end of day Tuesday will be paid on Friday. Otherwise, it will be paid on the subsequent Friday.
Your home department is automatically recognized when your expense report is created. If another department needs to be charged for an Expense Item(s), please complete an Inter-Office Department Transfer Form, located on MyCia, and send to the budget controller of the department you need to charge. They should then sign and approve the expense transfer, and submit the completed form to the Business Affairs Department.
Approver Instructions
Once the expense report is submitted, the approver will receive an email notification. The email has a link that will take you directly to the Expense Report inside Paycor.
Note: While the option to approve or deny the Expense Report is presented at the bottom of the email, you should not approve the Expense Report from this email view because you are not able to see the receipts or full details from this email snapshot. Instead, you must sign into Paycor Expense Management and pull up the expense report you are reviewing to see the receipts and report in full. This helps you ensure the Expense Report is in compliance with CIA's expense reimbursement policies, and that you understand what you are approving.
From your Dashboard you can click on the Requires Approval tab, and then on the blue link for the report number you want to review.
The expense report will open, listing all the expenses.
Click on the drop down menu under Actions, click on Print Report.
Note: you do not need to actually print the report. Clicking this provides you with a PDF of the report and shows you all the receipts attached to the expense report.
A detailed summary of the expense report will appear along with images of the receipts.
After reviewing the receipts and expense report close the tab, scroll down to bottom of the report, and approve report or deny report. If you deny please give reason for denying.
If the expense report is denied, the submitter will receive an email asking for additional information and they will be able to correct and resubmit.
After you approve the report it will move along for Business Affairs to review and the AP Administrator will approve it and then pay it.