This gets a bit off-topic, sorry.<p>The British Broadcasting Company started a rule about "no biscuits for meetings of only internal BBC staff". That saved them over £200,000. I don't know what that was in USD in 2001, but it's a reasonable amount. <i></i>I also don't know how much good-will they lost amongst staff.<i></i><p>(<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2001/jul/25/broadcasting.bbc" rel="nofollow">http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2001/jul/25/broadcasting.bbc</a>)<p>> <i>According to a report compiled by the BBC's "revenue, procurement and services" department, the BBC spends £3m a year on catering hospitality, of which £350,000 goes on free tea and coffee for staff - not counting refreshments provided for meetings. </i><p>> <i>A further £210,000 is spent annually on biscuits for meetings of BBC executives and middle managers, with half of the snacks consumed at BBC Television Centre in west London. About £500,000 goes on complimentary lunches, meals and buffets for employees; £80,000 on alcohol and £100,000 on "miscellaneous staff events". </i><p>Remember that the BBC is funded by a "tax" / licence fee that people must pay if they install or use a TV to receive broadcast signals. "TV" in that sentence includes computers / smart phones capable of receiving live streaming Internet. "Broadcast signals" in that sentence does not just include BBC. A person might never watch anything by the BBC, they still need to pay the tax.
As a general rule, people get punished if something they're responsible for lets something bad happen. They almost never get rewarded for removing unnecessary rules and regulations caused by overreactions to those bad things happening.<p>Examples of this abound.
So he shredded and did not reclaim $1500 in expenses because it would took an hour of his time to do so? (assuming it would take as much as it would "Heather")<p>Am I understanding this correct? <i>He threw away</i> $1500 because he couldn't be bothered to turn in the receipts?<p>Am I the only one that can't quite bring up a lot of sympathy for such a situation? "The tyranny" ... come <i>on</i>. Not if you're in a position to "make the rational decision" to throw away $1500.
Sometimes I wonder whether e.g. schools are absolutely petty about buying replacement pencils in the hope that this reduces the only cost which matters for schools which, for political reasons, they have nearly no control over: employee salary and benefits.<p>Thirty seven weeks to get a $12 receipt reimbursed might eventually cause someone to quit, saving you millions.
It seems that the larger the company, the harder the expense report is to fill out. Given the amount of time people spend filling out expense reports you would think that companies would want them to be easier, but I suspect that if expense reports were easier then people wouldn't just eat $1500. Making the expense reporting process hard directly benefits the company at a highly distributed cost to employees. What would be great is to see some of the internal emails or meeting minutes where this is actually decided.