Foreign currency transactions can be handled differently in Perk, depending on your company’s location and your company card provider. 

Why are my transactions in a different currency than my expense reports?

Perk converts all expense amounts in foreign currencies to your company currency. However, for transactions, currency conversion is dependent on your company card provider, meaning that it may occur that the transaction and corresponding expense report are listed in separate currencies.

Why do the expense amount and transaction amount differ from each other?

When converting foreign currency expense amounts, Perk uses a different approach to conversion than company card providers do. What’s more, company card providers may add transaction fees to any foreign currency transactions you make using your company card.

These two factors may lead to minor differences when comparing the transaction amount, converted and calculated by your card provider, to the the expense amount, converted and calculated by Perk.

However, this difference does not prevent the transactions from being automatically or manually matched in Perk so long as it isn’t significant. 

After submitting an expense, if you realize that the difference is too significant for matching to occur, simply recall the expense report, add a Comment to draw attention to the outstanding match, and resubmit it. Your finance team can handle the transaction-expense report after resubmission.

Why do some transactions include the foreign currency fee, whereas other transactions separate it?

The way foreign currency fees are handled depends on the banking provider of your company card. At some banks, this fee is combined with the original transaction amount, but at others, they may create separate charges for the transaction amount and the foreign currency fee.

Your company will provide you guidance on how to handle separate foreign currency fees on transactions if they occur; generally, one of the two methods outlined below will be applied.

How can I handle transactions with a separate foreign currency fee?

As stated, how foreign currency fee transactions are handled is dependent on your company-specific policies. The two main methods are:

1. Create and submit the expense report twice, with the first expense report being matched to the corresponding transaction and the second expense report being manually matched to the foreign currency fee transaction. This generates a duplicate warning on the expense reports, but submission is possible, nonetheless.
2. Create an expense report with your receipt, which matches to the main transaction after submission, and then creating an expense report without receipt for the foreign currency fee transaction to be matched to.

Tip: See how to manually match and create an expense report without receipt for a transaction.

Note: While these are the most common methods of handling separate foreign currency fee transactions in Perk, there are several alternatives. Therefore, please check your company-specific policies before taking an approach to foreign currency fee transactions in Perk.