*twitch*

[green_dreams]

Ways to make your travel-claim slaughter-woman[1] happy:

	Include original receipts. Photocopies and faxes make the baby cheque-cutter cry.
	Do not staple. Copies must be made of everything you send in. Also, stapling just means I can't even check your claim until I extract every last flimsy and thimble-sized taxi receipt from the staple's mangled metal jaws, which requires battling my sentient In box for the corpse of the staple remover. I understand you sometimes can't avoid it, but if you can, do.
	Yes, I need your address. Please don't write a note telling me to check your other claim in the space for the address, especially if said other claim is not in the same envelope.
	Your name would be cool, too.
	Please include the reason for travel on the claim. Yes, I can probably match up your itinerary with the date and the event, but this is about making me *happy*, dammit.
	Don't ask for a split cheque. Or if you do, include two travel claims--one with the amount and address for the first cheque, and one with the amount and address for the second.
	With original receipts.
	I am so sorry about my predecessor. If you organize a lynch mob, drop me a line.
	If you sent her the original receipts and she lost them, let us know. There are things we can do. The hardest part is usually sending off an explanatory justification without telling the world what I think of my predecessor. It helps that half the Finance people hear her name and groan.
	Yes, the Travel department is overworked. Yes, there is a significant backlog in processing claims. Yes, they have been working overtime since this time last year, and are currently getting in about two hundred claims a day. Yes, four-fifths of the claims they get are impossible to process due to clerical error. No, I cannot do anything about this except make sure that none of the claims I submit are impossible to process.
	Or-ig-i-nal. Re-ceipts. It's okay. You have to let them out into the big bad world sometime.
	Okay, you know that backlog? Yes. I realize you have been told how large it is. Please keep in mind that said backlog does not date from when you signed the claim. It dates from the time when--after you signed it and gave it to your assistant to mail and they got the address to mail it to and it was mailed and it got here and it went to the bottom of the pile and I got to it and I checked your math and I handed it off to get signed and it got signed and I made copies and stamped them both and dropped the original in the internal mail--it got to the Travel department.
	Please don't cry. I am trying to get you your money as quickly as possible. I know exactly how much you spent, I know you were only told about the backlog two weeks ago, I know it is reasonable to expect a faster turnaround, and I'm very sorry.

Failing all else:

If you print your airplane booking confirmation on the back of an article summary of cytologic diagnosis of cat-scratch disease by fine-needle aspiration--thank you. You have saved paper. And in my mood, a chance to read about benign lymphadenitis characterised by suppurative granulomas and bacilli identification with silver impregnation stains as an alternative to excision is actually quite suitable.

---
[1] Not the formal term, but trust me, these things need to be beaten to death with a stick before Finance even thinks about processing them. Which I personally approve of.

Comments

[mzdemonique.livejournal.com]

i love the little skull bullet-points!

[harald387.livejournal.com]

I love the little skulls. So very goth.

-K