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Manage your company settings in Yokoy

Yokoy Team avatar
Written by Yokoy Team
Updated over 2 weeks ago

🌐 Web | 👤 Yokoy admin with Company settings permission

During the onboarding process, all the general setup of your company has been done by your Yokoy implementation team. However, you can edit some of these settings as required under Admin > Company.

❗️ Warning

These settings have an impact on Yokoy behavior. Make sure you select the applicable company (legal entity) and understand the impact on your company before making any changes.


General settings

In this section, you can adjust the general settings of your company such as the name of your selected company, your language, and your company's currency.

Field

Description

Name

The name of the legal entity for which these settings are applicable.

Country

Country in which the entity is located or incorporated. This is important for Tax/VAT settings.

Language

Your preferred language and date format for this legal entity.

Users can also change this for their specific view in My profile.

Company currency

The currency for this entity. All expenses are converted in real-time to the company currency to check it against the company policy.

Company Code (ERP)

Some finance systems (e.g., SAP, Abacus, etc.) require a code for each legal entity to book the expenses to the correct legal entity when exporting them. By default, this is set to na when it is not applicable.

Distance measure

The measurement system your company uses, which is either displayed as kilometers or miles. This is applicable for mileage expenses.

Exchange rates source

Foreign exchange service used to calculate currency conversion. See FX rates and currency conversion in Yokoy.

Office location

The address of your office. You must add at least one. You can add multiple addresses by clicking + Add new office location. These locations are used:

Tax ID

ID or number used for tax purposes. You can add more than one, as appropriate.


Approval and finance review

This section allows you to modify your company's expense approval process, which involves two steps:

  • Approval strategy (i.e. business approval)

  • Finance review strategy

Furthermore, you can select payment methods that do not require manager approval and prevent submitters from recalling expenses for the following statuses. If you make any changes, make sure to click Save afterwards. Otherwise, any changes may be lost.

Field

Description

This strategy is determined during the implementation process for your organization.

  • No approval required

  • Cost object approval

  • Line manager approval

  • Custom approval strategy

If your company requires an approval flow that varies from the standard review strategy (or combines line manager and cost object approval strategies), then you need to set up a custom workflow using the Workflow Designer.

You can change this strategy at any time; however, it will only apply to new documents. Existing expenses will use the previous strategy.

Activate auto approval

This option is only available if Cost object approval or Line manager approval is selected.

Enables automatic approvals if an expense is below a certain threshold and without warnings.

The threshold is specified in different locations depending on whether you select cost object approval or line manager approval:

  • Cost object approval: Admin > Cost objects

  • Line manager approval: HR > User management and select the corresponding user

This strategy is determined during the implementation process for your organization.

  • Manual review always required

  • Fully automated review

  • Auto-review if there are no warnings

Disable option to reject approval requests

Checking this checkbox prevents business approvers and finance users from permanently rejecting privately paid expense reports. They can only send the report back for changes.

If the checkbox remains unchecked, privately paid expense reports can be permanently rejected, but company card and travel expenses cannot.

Payment methods that do not need manager approval

Choose the payment options (Paid privately, Company card, and Travel provider) that do not require approval from a cost object owner or line manager. Any expenses with these payment methods are sent directly to finance review.

Prevent submitters from recalling expenses for the following statuses

Choose the statuses (in approval, in review, ready for export) in which you don’t want submitters to be able to recall expenses. For example, you may not want submitters to be able to recall an expense that has been approved and reviewed, and is ready for export.


Expense report definition

This section determines the visibility of per diem and mileage expense types, and allows you determine how specific expense scenarios are managed in Yokoy.

Option

Description

Enable per diem

Enable per diems, calculation and reimbursement. You can determine where you want submitters to be able to access per diem creation.

Enable mileage expenses

Enable mileage tracking, calculation and reimbursement.
You can determine where you want submitters to be able to access mileage expense creation.

Mileage counter reset date

Define mileage accumulation criteria. Choose between Monthly and Annually (calendar year) to define the frequency at which the mileage of employees is to be reset. This allows you to define specific limits for the application of different mileage rates (e.g., up to 10000 km 0.75 CHF/km and from 10,001 0.60 CHF/km)

Allow expenses without receipt

Allow expenses to be created for receipts that were lost or that did not have a receipt. If this option is enabled, submitters can create privately paid expenses without receipt.

Enable receiptless expenses for card transactions

Allows submitters to create receiptless expenses only for card transactions. This covers both debit transactions and credit refunds.

Allow additional charges (tips, fees, etc.)

Allow charges to be added to the main category.If this option is enabled, submitters can add additional charges to the expense in a separate section in the expense report, which is not considered for VAT.

Enable multiple categories per expense

When activated, this allows a submitter to assign multiple categories to a single expense.

Enable booking split of remainder of additional charges

Allow split financial booking. If this option is enabled, additional charges in an expense report are booked in separate lines. If this option is disabled, the extracted total amount on an expense and additional charges are booked on a single line.

Enable modifications split for per diem booking lines

If this option is enabled, modifications to a per diem are booked as separate lines. If disabled, a per diem including any modifications is booked on a single line.

Note: this is not compatible with Enable taxable/non-taxable amount split for per diem booking lines. If both options are selected, Yokoy only splits per diems into taxable/non-taxable lines.

Enable taxable/non-taxable amount split for per diem booking lines

Split per diem lines into taxable and non-taxable amounts. This is applicable for all finance systems that are exporting debit lines in their exports.

Note: this is not compatible with Enable modifications split for per diem booking lines. If both options are selected, Yokoy only splits per diems into taxable/non-taxable lines.

Enable XML attachments for expenses

Allow users to upload XML files as supporting documents to receipt and no receipt expenses, mileage claims, and per diems.

Note: Make sure your finance integration supports the import of XML files before enabling this option.

FX percentage surcharge

Set up a percentage that is added on top of the default Yokoy-managed exchange rate.

For example, if a user pays expenses with their private card, this surcharge compensates for unfavorable foreign exchange rates. However, it is recommended to use this option carefully as it applies the fixed percentage surcharge to all foreign currency expenses.

Enable category model v2

Enabling the V2 model Improves the category selection by our AI and Is enabled by default.

Disable cost object selection (Trips) and ignore cost objects (Expenses)

Checking this option removes the possibility for submitters to assign expenses/trips to cost objects themselves, cost objects are still mandatory.

Default cost object in user profile required
For trips, the cost object field is not shown but it also prevents submitters from creating a trip unless they have a default cost object (unlike an expense is created in draft status).


Therefore, you need to make sure that either:

  • user profile always has a default cost object

  • cost objects are optional for trips

Disable cost objects (Trips)

Cost objects are no longer mandatory in trips.


Compliance

This section contains settings that determine the notifications triggered when an expense fails to meet specific criteria, and who can perform certain actions on expenses.

Field

Description

Enable user-specific policies

Enable this option if your company has different expense policies/rules depending on the user’s position, geographic location or other characteristics within the same entity. For example, director expenses are only reimbursed if they exceed CHF 50.

If this option is enabled, you can configure various rules for different policies and assign them to a specific user in HR > User Management.

You must choose a policy that is set as default for new users when activating user-specific policies.

Use per diem name as business purpose

Selecting this option automatically populates the name of the per diem as the business purpose/description. If not selected, users need to specify a business purpose for their reimbursement request.

Enable exported expenses in Assistance menu

Enable this option if you want to enable assistants to view the exported expenses of the users they are assisting. This information is displayed in Assistance. See How can I manage spend in assistance for someone else?.

Notifications

These settings determine checks that Yokoy performs on expenses. Where the expense fails to pass the check, it is flagged with a notification. For more information, see Notifications in expenses.

Setting

Description

Enable duplicate warnings for per diems

Flags any duplicate per diems. See Allowance already claimed.

Don't allow trips with overlapping dates

Flags any trips that have the same dates. See Trip-specific notifications.

Flag expense rule breaches

Flags any expenses that don’t comply with expense rules. See Policy breach.

Flag weekend days

Flags if the expense falls on a weekend. See Weekend days.

Enable AI warnings (duplicates, amount validation)

Triggers warnings where AI detects a scenario where the expense does not comply. See AI-based warnings.

For amount validation, Yokoy flags expenses where the difference between the manually entered amount and AI-extracted amount is greater than a specified percentage. You can configure this percentage in Accepted deviation in percent field.

Notify if official supplier invoice is required

Flags expenses that require an invoice based on the amount. See Official invoice required.

Enable warnings for expenses without receipt

Flags any receiptless expenses without supporting documents. See No receipt expenses.

Enable warning if user cost object deviates from expense cost object

Flags any expenses where the cost object isn’t the same as the user’s default cost object. See Default cost object.

Enable warning for missing VAT/tax information

Flags any expenses without tax information. See VAT/tax rate.

Notify if Google Maps distance threshold exceeded

Flags mileage claims where the user has manually overwritten the auto-calculated distance. See Distance in mileage expenses.

Participants

Determines how Yokoy handles participants in expenses. See Configuring expense participants.

Manager access to analytics

Determines whether Managers (i.e. line managers) have access to analytics for their reports (direct or indirect).

Setting

Description

Download analytics of all subordinate cost objects

Allows managers to access and download data analytics related to the cost objects of their reports, both direct and indirect. This helps managers gain insights into spending patterns and budget management.

Only download analytics from the cost objects directly below

Restricts managers' access to data analytics related to cost objects of their direct reports only (unlike the previous setting that grants access to all indirect cost objects).

Finance role

Determines additional permissions for finance users. See Compliance setting for finance users.

Duplicate check settings

You can define when a duplicate warning is displayed for expenses by configuring how many parameters must match to trigger the warning.

The parameters are:

  • Tax number/Doc-Hash: The tax number refers to the unique VAT number of the business as seen on a receipt for an expense. The doc-hash, on the other hand, refers to the hash value of the file used for expense report creation (i.e., the picture or PDF). These two elements make up the most fundamental duplicate checking criteria

  • Total claim: The total claim refers to the Total Amount read out from the receipt of an expense

  • Currency: The currency refers to the currency read out from the receipt of an expense

  • Date: The date refers to the date read out from the receipt of an expense

  • Time: The time refers to the time read out from the receipt of an expense

✏️ Note

The fewer the parameters required for a warning to trigger, the more sensitive Yokoy is to false positives. While you can change these settings, it is recommended that you leave the settings configured for you initially.


Data export and ERP configuration

The Data export and ERP configuration section in Company settings contains multiple options to determine the behavior for exporting expenses.

Booking currency strategy

By default, Yokoy uses the closing rate of the previous day for a given expense unless a new rate is available. For example, if the expense was made on January 10, the closing rate of January 9 is used, regardless of the booking date. This procedure ensures that the conversion is tax compliant.

In Yokoy, you can choose one of three booking strategies for expenses:

  • Export amounts in original receipt currency: keep the accounting bookings in the original currency of the receipt.
    In this case, the FX conversion is conducted in your ERP system or any other system your company uses.

  • Export amounts in company currency: convert foreign exchange expenses in your company currency in Yokoy.

  • Export amounts in employee currency (fallback: company currency): convert the foreign exchange expenses in your employee's specific currency if it deviates from the company currency.

Export job and output

These settings determine what information is included as part of the export and the output. The impact of these settings depends on the target system and its configuration that has been set up in Admin > Integrations, Expense export.

Setting

Description

Exclude cost objects from export

Choose whether you want to exclude cost objects from the export or whether to keep them in the report.

Export attachments

Include any supporting documents during the exporting of expenses.

ZIP folder name for exported attachments

If you select Export attachments, choose a folder name for the attachments. By default, Yokoy uses Attachments.

Enable trip level export

Adds an additional spend type tab Trips in the Export Export page. to let Finance users export all trip expenses together.
See Export reviewed expenses, trips, transactions, and invoices.

Export per diem and mileage allowances separately to payroll

Split the export of expenses into two exports (i.e. for separate posting in finance accounting and payroll systems).

When enabled, this activates a separate section in Admin > Integrations, Expense export tab to let you configure a payroll system for export.

You can choose to split per diem amounts into:

  • taxable/non-taxable lines (Enable taxable/non-taxable amount split for per diem booking lines)

  • modifications (Enable modifications split for per diem booking lines).

You cannot split per diems by both criteria. If both options are selected, per diems are only split into taxable/non-taxable amounts.

Additional reports and files

Regardless of whether data is exported directly to a third-party system via API or as a file-based export (set up in Admin > Integrations), you can also generate other files that list all expenses exported.

Yokoy lets you generate these files:

Option

Description

Export accounting journal [.csv]

Generate the Yokoy standard accounting journal and specify the file name to be used when generating the output file.

Export payout file

Yokoy allows you to generate payout files in Swiss, German, French and UK PAIN formats.

Export report [.pdf]

Generate a summary of reviewed expense reports including attached receipts.

Export report with total per user [.pdf]

You can choose to generate a report that breaks down expenses by user and specify the file name to be used when generating the output file.

Export report per expense [.pdf]

You can choose to generate a report for each expense and specify the file name to be used when generating the output file.

These files can be accessed from Finance > Export log. They cannot be accessed via API.

Enable company cards

This section only appears if your organization has Yokoy Pay.

Enable trips

This section contains the settings for configuring trips in Yokoy. For more information, see Setting up trips in Yokoy.

Enable VAT/tax

This section only appears if your organization has enabled the VAT / tax module for reclaiming VAT and booking VAT / tax data. See Enable tax rates.

Notification service

The Notifications service section determines the scenarios when email notifications are sent to users. You can set up notifications for open tasks.

Yokoy can send email notifications to users (employees and approvers) to remind them about open tasks such as pending approvals, submitted expenses or invoices that need to be reviewed, unmatched transactions, etc. The email notification is triggered for expenses, trips and invoices. The email notifications use standard templates for all users. Currently, they cannot be customized.

You can choose the frequency and notification day with which the notifications are sent:

  • Monthly: choose any day of the month, from 1 to 28.

  • Weekly: choose any day of the week, from Monday to Sunday.

  • Daily: send on working days, at approximately 08:00 AM, Monday to Friday UTC.

You can test the notification service by clicking Send test email.

✏️ Note
Remember to save the form first to save the configuration.

Employee notifications

Yokoy checks daily for each company with notifications for open tasks (Remind employees about open tasks). For each user of the legal entity, Yokoy triggers an independent job to check if the user has pending task, collects the numbers, and then sends an email.

For example, if a submitter has unsubmitted expenses or has created a trip with dates falling in the past, they are considered open tasks.

Assistant notifications

If you select the Remind assistant about open tasks checkbox, users can choose to send notifications about open tasks to their assistant. To trigger notifications, users need to also select an assistant in the My assistant field in their profile and select the Notify assistant about open tasks checkbox. HR users can also trigger notifications for specific users directly in the user profile.

Assistants only receive notifications about expenses or invoices that are in draft status or that have been sent back. They do not receive notifications about approvals that users may need to perform. Only the user or their delegate can perform approvals.

Since users can choose whether to send notifications to their assistants or not, assistant notifications are sent separately to employee notifications.

Approver & Delegate notifications

Approvers are notified of any pending approvals. If a user has delegated their approvals to a delegate, which they have set up in My profile or in Manager > Cost objects, the delegate receives any notifications about pending approvals for that user, as well as their own expenses and approvals.

Enable tags

A tag is a custom dimension that can be added to each category for users, approvers, and finance users. Tags help map additional information to that spend and can be used at multiple levels for analytics, reporting and accounting purposes.

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