Employees working from home during the coronavirus pandemic claimed some outlandish expenses this year, including pricey exercise bikes, facelifts and private jets.
Emburse, an expense management software company, released a compilation Wednesday of some of the craziest expenses it has seen claimed this year, some of which were actually approved. That included $1,895, which was approved as a contribution for an employee's Peloton Bike under the explanation of “for health and wellness.” On the other hand, a $7,600 expense claim for a facelift was submitted under the category of “repairs and maintenance” but was rejected, despite the pressing need to look one’s best during a Zoom meeting.
Ekine Akuiyibo is the Chief Operating Officer at Socotra, where he oversees field engineering, product delivery, partnerships, training, and support. Prior to Socotra, Ekine spent 15 years in enterprise software development, sales, and services at Sun Microsystems, BAE Systems, and Oracle.
Most recently, Ekine worked on large scale ML problems at Oracle. He holds a PhD in Electrical Engineering from Stanford.
Minas Kourouglos is Vice President of Mergers and Acquisitions at Trucordia. He has served in that role for five years, having executed nearly 100 transactions ranging from $5M - $100M+ in valuation. Prior to Trucordia, he was the Managing Principal of a commercial insurance agency that sold to Trucordia in 2020. Before the insurance industry Minas spent over 10 years as a management consultant servicing multiple industries. Minas has an MBA from Virginia Commonwealth University and a BS from the University of Richmond.
Some expenses weren’t for working from home, but more about getting out of the house safely. An expense claim for a private jet charter costing over $20,000 was submitted and approved under the explanation of “required to limit COVID exposure for international shoots.” Another travel-related expense claim was $2,500 for a helicopter ride, which was not approved.
The $79 expense claim for a dog crate could perhaps be used for travel at some point when that's safer, but in these times it was more plausibly to provide "crate training [for] a new COVID puppy to not run into Zoom meetings."
Below is an infographic produced by Emburse showing this and several other head-scratching claims:
