Chrome River
Chrome River is the university’s travel management and expense system, where all travel is processed.
Key Facts
- Supported Browsers:
- Chrome
- Firefox
- Edge
- Safari
- Pre-approvals are required before traveling on university business.
- Non-employees, including students, do not have Chrome River access. Therefore, an employee must enter all their reports.
- Expense Reports (ER) must be filed within 30 days of the conclusion of travel.
- To add interviewees, students, and non-employees complete the Chrome River Vendor Create Request Form.
- To add fund numbers, complete the Chrome River Fund Request Form.
- All employees (permanent and temporary) have access to Chrome River, can submit expense reports, and access Chrome River to serve as a delegate for others.
Online Training Modules
Work at your own pace:- Pre-Approval - Mandatory document that authorizes travel.
- Expense Report - Reconciles travel expenses.
- T-card Reconciliation - An expense report is used to reconcile t-card charges before the trip has occurred.
- Cash Advance (PDF) – An expense report requests a cash advance when traveling with students and/or internationally.
Chrome River Login
Terminology
The pre-approval report, which authorizes employee travel, is mandatory for all university business travel.
Pre-Approval Checklist
- Agendas, itineraries, site contact emails for research visits, and event or team schedules are required documentation. Supporting documentation can include anything to support the trip's purpose, which clearly states the dates of travel and destination.
- Enter estimates for travel (i.e. airfare, lodging, registration, meals per diem, and any expenses related to the travel). If required by your department, documentation for the estimates is necessary.
The expense report is completed when filing for reimbursements and reconciling cash advances and T-card charges.
A delegate creates expense reports and pre-approvals for another person and can access their settings menu, home screen, and inquiry reports. You will receive email notifications regarding the rejection or approval of reports. However, you will not be able to approve reports that are routed to that person
Temporarily approve expenses reports, and/or pre-approvals for another person for specified timeframe in their absence.
This is where you will find all T-card transactions and uploaded receipts (emailed or CR SNAP).
A compliance warning indicates that additional information is required before the report can be submitted for approval and processing (I.e., expense is over 45 days old). Compliance warnings may be encountered when saving a line item or when submitting an entire report.
A compliance violation indicates that the report cannot be submitted for approval based on the policies defined in the system (i.e., missing receipts on expense reports). A compliance violation may be encountered when saving a line item or submitting an entire report.
Important to Know
The system automatically assigns the approval route based on university policies and procedures. If a report is routed to the wrong individual for approval, please contact Sonya Foster or Bivian Ejimakor.
Travel card transactions are fed into Chrome River automatically by Bank of America. There is typically a 2 - 5-day delay from the day the transaction is posted to Bank of America to the day it feeds into Chrome River. This delay may be longer (i.e., Hotels) based on when a vendor submits their transactions for processing.
Expense Reports filed (accounted for) outside of 30 days after travel are considered non-accountable. The expenses are subject to payroll tax withholding.
- P-Card charges are not fed into Chrome River.
- Procurement expenses are not documented as travel expenses. Thus, P-card expenses should not be included in a T-Card Expense Report.
Approving Reports in Chrome River
Chrome River will automatically route reports to the appropriate approvers based on system rules and assignments. The user will receive an email notification when they have a pre-approval or expense report in their approval queue. Users can approve via the Chrome River dashboard or by email.
The user can approve the report from their dashboard by logging into Chrome River. On the left side of the screen, under the Approvals Ribbon (highlighted in gold), select either Expense Report or Pre-Approval. If a zero appears by either category, no reports are available to approve.
- Choose the pre-approval or expense report that you wish to view.
- Click “Open” to view all expenses.
- Select an expense to view the expense details and scroll to the bottom to view attachments on the right side.
- After viewing all expenses, click the Approve button to approve the report.
- If there are any issues, click the return button to begin the return process.
- Enter the reason for return in the text box.
- Click the return button a second time to return the report to the report owner.
Chrome River will send an email to the user that requires their approval. The email will contain details of the expenses in the report and the expense summary at the bottom.
- The user can Accept (green button) or Return (red button) the report from the email.
- After clicking Accept, a pop-up email window will appear. You may type a response and must click Send to follow through with approval.
- If you click Return, a pop-up email window will appear, and you must type a reason for returning the report and click Send.
Routing in Chrome River
Chrome River Approval routing serves as a method to guarantee that essential information, such as documents, forms, files, and requests, undergoes review by the necessary approvers. Its purpose is to ensure compliance with all company regulations, standards, and business rules.
Numerous factors determine the routing of reports in Chrome River. The fund allocation(s) is the primary factor in determining approval routing in Pre-approvals and Expense reports.
- Budget Manager
- Supervisor
- Fund Manager (PI)
- Title III or Foundation (if applicable)
- Contracts and Grants (if applicable)
- APReview Firmwide - (This is the Travel Office’s queue for expense reports only. Pre-approval reports do not route to the travel office.)
Numerous factors determine the routing of reports in Chrome River. The fund allocation(s) is the primary factor in determining approval routing in pre-approvals and expense reports.
- Budget Manager
- Supervisor
- Fund Manager (PI)
- Contracts and Grants (if applicable)
- Dean - (Does not approve expense reports)
- Office of International Affairs - (Does not approve expense reports)
- Vice-Chancellor (Non-academic. Does not approve expense reports.)
- APReview Firmwide - (This is the Travel Office’s queue for expense reports only. Pre-approval reports do not route to the Travel Office.)
