Expenses on Mobile

Expenses on Mobile



If you have Expenses enabled on your Lightyear account, when you open your mobile app and access the same account, you will see Expenses on your home dashboard. 
Click here to find out how to enable Expenses on your Lightyear company.

Dashboard

When you first open Lightyear, you will land on the home dashboard which gives an overview of documents within your account. You will see a tile for Expenses that shows the number of Expenses that are Open i.e. Unreported or Reported in a Report that is not yet in the Closed status.


To access the Expenses section, you can click the above tile or click the Menu and go to Expenses, as shown below.

Regardless of the way you access Expenses, you will always land in the Expenses tab.

Create Expense

Upload Expense

If you have your receipt on hand, you can snap a photo of it from within the Lightyear app, or upload an existing image of it from your camera roll. This can be done from two different areas, one is within the Expenses section.

First, click the green +  in the bottom right.

A menu will popup with a couple different options. Here you want to click the Upload an Image option.

You'll have the choice to access Camera to take a photo, or Photos if you want to select an image that already exists in your Camera Roll.

After you've snapped or selected an image, it will land in the Processing tab as indicated by the orange unread icon next to the tab at the top of your screen. The document(s) that are currently extracting via Smart Extract will be in the status Processing. While the document is Processing, you won't be able to click on it to view any of the details.

When Smart Extract has completed, the document will either go into the Expenses tab with all required fields extracted, or stay in Processing. If it stays in Processing, it will now be in the status of Needs Attention as it will be missing some required fields - Merchant, Expense Date or Expense Number. For full details on how to edit and add any additional detail in, see the Edit Expense section.

The second method of uploading an image is from the main Dashboard. You will see the Upload Doc button.

Clicking this opens a menu with document types. In this case you will need to select Expense.

And you will be presented with the same options to access Camera to take a photo, or Photos if you want to select an image that already exists in your Camera Roll.

After you've snapped or selected an image, it will land in the Processing tab as indicated by the orange unread icon next to the tab at the top of your screen. The document(s) that are currently extracting via Smart Extract will be in the status Processing. While the document is Processing, you won't be able to click on it to view any of the details.

When Smart Extract has completed, the document will either go into the Expenses tab with all required fields extracted, or stay in Processing. If it stays in Processing, it will now be in the status of Needs Attention as it will be missing some required fields - Merchant, Expense Date or Expense Number. For full details on how to edit and add any additional detail in, see the Edit Expense section.

Manually Create Expense

Navigate into the Expenses tab and click the green +  in the bottom right.

Select the option for Create Manual Expense.

This will take you to a page that allows you to enter the data for your expense claim. If you use our desktop version of Expenses you will be familiar with these fields, if you haven't, don't worry, that'll be explained below.

Enter the Merchant Name where you have spent the money needing to be reimbursed e.g. Tesco, Coles, Target, etc. The Expense Date is the date when the money was spent. Prior to creating the Expense, you can select or create a Report automatically add the Expense into upon creation.

To add details about what was purchased on the expense, you can click the first Line Item displayed which will open the below page.

The Description, Quantity and Unit Price refer to the item(s) purchased and are required fields. Tax Code will automatically populate based on your accountancy software defaults, but can be changed by selecting the dropdown and selecting another.

Account, Category 1 and Category 2 are accountancy software specific and will be required by your finance team in order to categorise your Expenses. You can fill this out within the Create screen, or later on while viewing in the Expenses tab.

When you've entered the line item, you can click Confirm in the top right and this will send you back to the previous screen. If you want to add multiple line items, you can do so by clicking + Add Line Item 

If you need to remove a line item, swipe from right to left and you'll see the Delete option appear.

Once you've filled out all required details, click Create at the bottom of your screen.

Edit Expense

If you need to edit your Expense you can do so after it has been created, depending on the status of the Expense or Report it is within.
Please Note: Editable statuses for an Expense include Unreported or Reported while the Report is in Draft or Pending Approval. Once it has been Approved, it can no longer be edited, unless moved backwards through the flow. 
To edit an Expense, tap on it from within the Expenses tab. You will be shown a Summary view of the details, including an overview of the Line Item Description, Account and Categories, if enabled within your Settings.

If the Report is within an editable status, the Edit button within the top right will be active and clickable. If not, it'll be slightly greyed out and you won't be able to click it.

Once you've clicked Edit, you'll see the same view as Create Expense, with your previously entered details populated. 

After any necessary changes have been made, click Save and then Cancel to go back to the Summary screen.

Create Report

A Report can be created from within the Expenses area, or while you are selecting a Report from a dropdown. For simplicity, let's walkthrough the steps to create a Report from within the Expense tabs.

Navigate into the Expenses tab and click the green +  in the bottom right, then select Create Expense Report.

You'll see a short form with four fields that should auto-populate with details.

Report Name will default to 'Expense Report' with today's date. The Date will default to today. The Currency will default to the currency of your Lightyear account i.e. GBP for UK, AUD for AU, USD for US, etc. The currency can be changed to represent the currency of the Expenses that will later be within the Report, once set you will not be able to add multiple currencies to the same Report. The Submitter will default to yourself if you have an Expense Supplier set up in Lightyear with your user set as the Linked User. If the Submitter has not populated for you, you can search for your name within the dropdown list. If you can't find it there, you'll need to reach out to an Admin on your Lightyear account to get this set up.

Once all fields are populated, click Save as Draft to create the Report.

Edit Report

If you need to edit your Report you can do so after it has been created, depending on the status of the Report.
Please Note: Editable statuses for a Report include Draft or Pending Approval. Once it has been Approved, it can no longer be edited, unless moved backwards through the flow. 
To edit a Report, tap on it from within the Reports tab. You will be shown a Summary view of the details, including an overview of the Expenses held within the Report, if any.

If it is within an editable status, the Edit button within the top right will be active and clickable. If not, it'll be slightly greyed out and you won't be able to click it.

Once you've clicked Edit, you'll see the same view as Create Report, with your previously entered details populated. 

Once there are Expenses within the Report, you won't be able to edit the Currency or Submitter.

After any necessary changes have been made, click Save and then Cancel to go back to the Summary screen.

Add to Report

Once you have created your Report, you will need to add Expenses into it before it can be Submitted and later Reimbursed to you.

You can add Expenses to a Report from within the Expenses tab, while looking at an individual Expense or from within a Report.

From the Expenses Tab

While viewing the Expenses Tab, you'll see the Select option. Clicking this will allow you to select Unreported Expenses.

Using the checkboxes to the left, select the Expenses you want to add into your Report then click Add to Report at the bottom of your screen.

You'll see a list of Reports that are in Draft or Pending Approval that can accept additional Expenses.

From the Expense

If you have selected an Unreported Expense and are viewing the Summary view, you will see an Add to Report button. Click this to display a list of Reports that are in Draft or Pending Approval that can accept additional Expenses.

From the Report

From within the Report Summary or Edit Report screen, you'll see an Add Expenses button if the Report is in Draft or Pending Approval and can accept additional Expenses to be added in.

Clicking this will give you a list of all Unreported Expenses that can be added into the Report. 

Make your selection(s) using the checkboxes on the left of the screen then click Add to Report.

Submit Report

When the Report has been created and you have added your Expenses, it can be Submitted for Approval, which will then send it down any existing approval workflow to be approved. This is the first step of the process of getting your Report reimbursed.

Head over to the Reports tab and find a Report in the Draft status. Click it to see the Summary view. Click the Submit for Approval button at the bottom of the screen.

Expense Settings

On the Lightyear app you can choose which fields are displayed within the Summary view of the Expense. 

If you go to the Menu and select Settings, if you have Expenses enabled on any account, you will see the options to enable the Description, Account or Categories to be displayed.

When enabled, these will display a summary of what's selected against the Expense line items. For example, if you have one line on the Expense it will display what's on this line. If you have multiple lines, and they all have the same Account and Categories, this will be displayed. If there are different Accounts and Categories selected across the lines, this will display as Split in the Summary view. Regardless of how many lines there are, the Description will always display what's on the first line of the Expense.
 
If you set these to Yes, the Summary view will display something similar to this:

If you set these to No, the Summary view will display something similar to this:

Please Note: This setting applies across all accounts you are logged into on the app. If you turn the setting off on one account, it will be off on all accounts.



      

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