Travel Card (TCard)
The Travel Card (TCard) is an official University of Utah credit card issued in an employee’s name, similar to the Purchasing Card (PCard). The employee to whom the card is issued is responsible for all purchases made with the card. The purchases must be made by the employee, who is on (or arranging) an official university business trip and be made in accordance with all applicable university and other regulations, policies, rules, and procedures.
The contract for the Travel Card is held with US Bank. We reserve the right to close Travel Cards. Unauthorized or improper use of the Travel Card will result in card cancellation or possible cardholder disciplinary action, up to and including employee suspension or termination.
Your supervisor will be required to approve your application before it can be reviewed by Travel & Reimbursement Services.
Once approved, your application will be processed by the Travel office. It may take up to 10 business days for your TCard to arrive and be available for pickup.
All travel cardholders will be required to uphold the travel cardholder agreement and use their TCard in accordance with the rules and regulations of the Travel Card program. You must be a Concur user to obtain a TCard.
If you leave your department, you must cancel your TCard.
Used for: individual trips or group leader trips
Standard limit: $4,000 per transaction/$12,000 monthly
- Conference registration fees
- Lodging/hotel pre-payments
- Baggage fees
- Car rental
- Ground transportation (eg: Uber, taxis, etc.)
- Parking fees while traveling
- Fuel while traveling
- Business meals while traveling
Used for: employee, guest or group trips
Standard limit: $10,000 per transaction/$30,000 monthly
- Conference registration fees for employee/guest
- Lodging/hotel pre-payments for employee/guest
- Baggage fees
- Lodging/hotel
- Ground transportation or parking while traveling
- Parking fees while traveling
- Event/entrance fees
- Business meals while traveling
- Personal or per diem-related meals
- Any expense that should be charged to a purchasing card (PCard)
- Any non-travel-related expenses
- Any items that are a violation of university policy
Travel Card Use
The card can only be used for travel-related expenses. For university employees, travel is defined as 100 miles or more from campus and/or overnight.
Expenses will typically be lodging, airfare and baggage fees, vehicle rentals, ground transportation, conference registration fees, and other hotel-related expenses.
Cardholders are not allowed to send their cards with another traveler.
Individual travelers and arrangers traveling with a group may make pre-payments, and pay at checkout with their TCard. Hotels usually require their guests to provide ID and a credit card with a matching name upon check-in, but arrangements can often be made beforehand for guests and groups to charge their rooms to the arranger’s card which is not present. Any cardholder who will not be traveling, but making lodging/hotel arrangements for guests/groups is responsible for working this out with the hotel beforehand.
We recommend that airfare be booked through the university’s onsite travel agents. If the traveler or arranger decides to use their TCard to book directly with the airline, they will be responsible for making any necessary changes.
Much like hotels, car rental companies usually require the driver to provide ID and credit card with matching names. Since the TCards are issued in the traveler/arranger’s name, this is not a problem if the cardholder is also the driver. If the cardholder will not be present upon pickup, the TCard holder will be responsible for making the necessary arrangements with the rental company.
TCards may be loaded onto a rideshare app to use for rides (Uber/Lyft). Cardholders may only load their TCards onto their own profile. TCards may also be used for any taxi service that accepts credit cards and issues receipts.
Conferences often partner with local hotels to offer group rates on their block of rooms, these are also acceptable TCard transactions. Any additional conference packages may also be paid for with a TCard as long as the charge follows departmental and chartfield policy.
The TCard may not be used to purchase any meal that would otherwise be covered by the per diem. These are the individual meals that are not provided by the conference or host. Travelers and arrangers are allowed to use the card to pay for business meals (and catering) that include more than one person. All meals that are provided by a group conference, including group meals paid for by traveler, will be excluded from the traveler’s per diem.
You cannot purchase gift cards with the TCard.
Reconciling Travel Card Purchases
Employees must be trained on and have access to the Concur travel system in order to have a Travel Card.
All purchases made with the Travel Card will be imported to the cardholder’s “Available Expenses” section in their Concur profile. This can be easily found under the “Expense” tab. These authenticated TCard charges can be included with any out-of-pocket expenses incurred by the traveler. The system will automatically identify which charges are reconciled to the card, and which expenses are paid back to the traveler. Once the expenses are submitted on an expense report, they will go through the approval flow and appear on the department’s management report.
Money is not drawn from the university chartfield until the expenses are submitted and approved in a Concur expense report.
Since the TCards look and feel just like any other credit card, sometimes cardholders can mistake them for personal cards and make a non-business transaction. Any personally incurred transactions will still need to be submitted on a Concur expense report marked as “Personal/Non-Reimbursable” in Concur travel which will require the employee to pay personal transactions back to the university.
The employee (or arranger) must prepare an expense report within 30 days of trip completion for the Travel Card transactions or any other out-of-pocket expenses. If the employee is owed money due to out-of-pocket expenses and meal per diem, the university will issue them a reimbursement. If the employee owes the university money, they will need to issue the university a check so their department can do a departmental deposit to obtain the funds back.
If the traveler or travel arranger fails to submit expenses on an expense report in a timely manner, an expense report will be submitted by Travel & Reimbursement Services on the traveler’s behalf and the department may be charged an additional penalty fee. These expenses must be reconciled by the travel office each billing cycle, so timely submissions are critical.
