Chrome River tips & tricks

Please refer to the ASR-Administrative Support Resources guide when completing a Chrome River expense report to ensure all required information is being provided. Common problems that delay approval can be avoided in the following ways:

• Business Purpose/Justification Standards - Explains why an expense was necessary and how the University benefits from making the purchase. This explanation should make sense to someone unfamiliar with your role.
• Transaction Expense Types - This is the classification of what an expense is, and therefore which account code(s) will be available for use. These are most easily edited for TCard purchases in the eWallet, so verifying before adding an expense to a report is highly recommended. 
• Correct Allocation/Chartstring - Chrome River will remember your most frequently used chartstrings, which is helpful as long as you have trained it correctly. To ensure you are using the correct chartstring, please refer to the Reimbursement EFS/Account Code Information.
• Meal Purchases - When allowed by policy, meal purchases must identify all participants by name and affiliation to the University. Several of the meal expense types will ask for names in Chrome River, otherwise they can be listed in additional information or by attaching a PDF of a calendar invite.
• Lodging-Room Charge - Always complete the Allowable Total field so Chrome River can calculate the amount policy allows for your travel destination. Leaving this blank will result in a compliance warning (i.e. more work for you).

Bonus Tip: Do not withdraw and resubmit an expense report in an attempt to “move it to the top of the pile.” Chrome River expense reports route based on the most recent submission date, so re-submitting without a specific reason (i.e. modification request, adding additional expenses) effectively moves the report to the bottom of the pile and can trigger new compliance warnings.

Chrome River tips & tricks

When submitting an expense report, receipts are required for all non-meal per diem expenses $25+. It is important to attach complete receipts as every supplier formats them differently. Scanned or PDF receipts should not be missing pages, and pictures of receipts should not be cropped because it could exclude transaction information.

Chrome River tips & tricks

When itemizing a lodging expense on an expense report, always complete the “Allowable Total” field on the “Room Charge” component. Filling this in will automatically check the amount spent compared to the per diem limit for the travel destination. Leaving this field blank will result in unnecessary compliance warnings (i.e., extra steps for you), and will require manual review of the costs before approval. Bonus Tip! Lodging itemizations do not need to be broken out by date, but can be submitted as category subtotals for the entire stay.

When finalizing a purchase, please be aware of any sellers that offer and/or include an automatic round-up for charity. While it can be good to support various causes, the University is prohibited from making charitable donations, so these cannot be included when the University is paying (e.g. PCard, TCard, or reimbursement) for the purchase. This type of expense must be removed from expense reports before approval.

On-going Google Chrome browser error: “Bad Message 431”

There have been reports about an error message when logging into various University web resources that are behind authentication, like Jadu forms or our Drupal websites. The error message states: “Bad Message 431 reason: Request Header Fields Too Large”.

This issue appears to be isolated to Google Chrome, and is a caching and cookie bug that is inconsistently affecting a small number of users. Some folks may never get this message, but others may repeatedly see it. You can get rid of the message by clearing your browser cache and cookies. It is recommended to clear browsing data for “all time”, as the other timing options do not always work to prevent this error. Once you clear your browser cache and cookies, this should resolve the issue. But if it returns after a few days, clear the cache and cookies again.

This issue has been escalated to various teams in OIT who are investigating. If this issue is reported to you, please instruct the person to clear their browser cache and cookies (provide the linked instructions if needed) and to try accessing the resource again. They can also try accessing the resource from a different browser. If you have repeated issues, please contact help@umn.edu.

Chrome River reminders

As conference opportunities increase and travel plans are made, please be mindful of these common errors when filling out your expense reports:

• The business purpose (aka justification) needs to clearly address how attending the conference benefits the department/University. Simply stating conference, professional development, or PERR# does not meet the policy standard. Please see the Justifications/Business Purpose job aid for additional guidance.
• When itemizing your lodging expense, always complete the Allowable Total worksheet/calculation on the Room Charge portion. This field coordinates the verification between expense and per diem limit, which will resolve many of the compliance warning scenarios related to lodging. Please see steps 3c-e of the Lodging Itemization job aid for additional guidance.
• If your travel includes extra personal time either before or after the main conference, always include documented comparisons for airfare (i.e. Conference only vs. Conference plus additional days) from the date airfare was originally purchased so we can document that the department is not taking on additional expenses.

Chrome River reminder & feature updates

As activities continue to return to normal, please remember that all of our purchases need to include a statement of how the purchase benefits the department/University. The business purpose job aid provides guidance on writing strong justifications.

Chrome River also recently updated two features for improved user experience. The corresponding University job aids available online and in the system are still being updated to reflect the new functionality:

• Labels in the eWallet have been clarified based on user feedback.
• You should now see Out-of-Pocket Expenses and U Travel Card which replace Offline and Credit Card, respectively.
• Out-of-Pocket items continue to be created based on receipts emailed into Chrome River, but they may belong to a Travel Card purchase if the receipt is emailed before the credit card transaction is reported by the bank (approx. 2-5 business days depending on the supplier).

• Expense owners will now have the ability to Recall an expense report that has been Returned by an approver.
• Expense reports in Returned status have limited edit capabilities. If you are asked to make a modification but the field(s) are not editable or an action is not allowed, try Recalling the expense report to your Drafts folder which should make the report fully editable.