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Advice

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Entry time:	Tue Feb 3 13:36:30 2026
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<p>Below is some advice. The most important point is that you must file a eTravel request online at <a href="http://etravel.osu.edu">etravel.osu.edu</a>.</p> <p><u>General Advice</u></p> <ul> <li><em>Overestimate all of your expenditures.</em> The university gets really upset if your expenditures come back larger than your travel request budget, but don't care if you spend less. So always overestimate. You can usually accomplish this easiest by over estimating your taxi/parking needs, hotel wifi needs, etc. My travel requests are usually $200-$300 higher than my actual expenditures.</li> <li><em>Never travel without filing an eTravel request, even if you don't intend to spend money. </em>The university gets very upset if you travel without filing and getting the eRequest approved <em>before you leave.</em> This is also important from a protections standpoint. If you are injured during travel, or get stranded for some reason (especially internationally), the university travel insurance and extraction policy will kick in, but only if you have filed a eTravel request first.</li> <li><em>Start your eTravel request at least 1 week in advance.</em> You will work with our administrator Eric Robbins to file your travel request, and the admins are instructed to try and have paperwork moving 1 week or more before your travel starts.</li> <li><em>Budget roughly $1000 minimum for any domestic air trip, and roughly $2000 for any international air trip.</em> A 4-day conference like APS April meeting typically comes out around $1500; a big 10-day international conference like ICRC is usually more like $2500-$3000.</li> <li><em>Save all receipts (itemized) except for food.</em> You need itemized receipts for anything you buy that you want to be reinbursed for, except food.</li> <li><em>If you want to take vacation during travel, or want to drive to a location instead of fly, you must do a comparison form.</em> ASC wants to make sure money is spent wisely, so you need to file a comparison form, found here: <a href="https://u.osu.edu/hafs2017/files/2016/12/Travel-Comparison-Worksheet-106z30q.pdf">https://u.osu.edu/hafs2017/files/2016/12/Travel-Comparison-Worksheet-106z30q.pdf</a></li> </ul> <p><u>Advice for Doing your Cost Esimates</u></p> <ol> <li>Transportation <ol> <li>If you are flying: either enter the value of the flight (if you have already bought it) or a generous over-estimate of the cost. Don't forget to include baggage fees. You have to buy air tickets through Concur these days, and the eRequest must be filed to pay for the ticket, so estimating this accurately really isn't a big deal anymore. A domestic flight out of CMH typically runs between $300-$500. An international flight is probably $1000.</li> <li>If you are driving: estimate both the cost of the rental car and the cost of gas for the rental car. Upload the rental car receipt, and maps of where you are going with mileage list (google maps will do this). Estimate gas at a rate of $3/gal (this is generous). You <em>must</em> rent your car from either Enterprise or National according to the university rental car contract, and should probably book it through Concur to be safe: <a href="https://osutravel.osu.edu/discounts/rental-car-discounts/">https://osutravel.osu.edu/discounts/rental-car-discounts/</a></li> <li>If you are taking a train/bus/etc: treat this like you would treat flying.</li> <li>Taxis: you are reimbursed for getting to and from the airport in both Columbus and your destination city. Estimate $30 in taxis for each trip to the airport (so $120 total).</li> <li>Parking/Metro: If you are going to need parking, make sure to estimate it. In an expensive city, this might be upwards of $10/hour.</li> </ol> </li> <li>Meals <ol> <li>Food reimburstment is done <em>per-diem.</em> This means you receive a fixed stipend for food for every meal you have to eat while travelling. The amount varies on where you travel; more expensive cities (NYC) will have higher per-diem rates than cheaper cities (Palestine TX). You can use the per-diem estimator to figure out what meals you are reimburst for. It's your job to stick to the per diem budget, otherwise extra food comes from your pocket. They will not require you to turn in individual receipts for food because of the per-diem policy. The per-diem budget is usually very generous, and for the pre-travel request, you should assume you need all of it. When you file the actual expenditure reports, you should probably only request as much per-diem as you need to actually cover the cost of your food (don't make money off the trip in other words). John Beacom gave some good advice which I attached.</li> </ol> </li> <li>Hotels <ol> <li>If you have made a hotel reservation, file for the estimate on your reservation plus ~10% for taxes, and maybe an extra $15/night for Wifi. If you haven't made a reservation, make some approriate estimate. In a big city (Chicago, NYC) you probably can't get a room near the conference for <$160 per night. In a cheaper city, ~$100 is probably a good estimate. Always check to see if the conference/meeting has arranged a discounted hotel block.</li> </ol> </li> <li>Registration <ol> <li>Most major conferences have registration fees. These typically vary from $50 up to $300 if you're staff/postdoc/facutly. Make sure to include this in your estimate, and attach your regsitration receipt. If you're registering onsight, make sure to keep this receipt.</li> </ol> </li> <li>Other <ol> <li>If you are doing any international travel, you likely need a VISA. If Amy agrees to reimburse this, you can file it here.</li> </ol> </li> </ol> <p><u>When you Get Back</u></p> <p>When you get back, you should email all of your receipts (except food) to Eric Robbins so he can start your reimbursement procedure. The sooner you start this, the sooner you get your money back. It typically takes about 6 weeks, though it can happen in as few as 2.</p> <p><u>For Young Travelers</u></p> <p>Travel at OSU is done on a reinburstment model. This means you will pay for the entire trip out of pocket, and be reimbursed after you get back. This reimbursement process typically take about 6 weeks. This means two things.</p> <ol> <li>You will likely have the cost of the trip on your credit card bill for at least one monthly cycle. If you do not have the liquid cash to pay for this, you would be charged interest on this! That's crazy. Instead, you should request a travel advance. The university will write you a check before you leave for the cost of most of your trip. This way you are not out the cost of the trip while your reimbursement paperwork is being processed. Tell Eric, and he can do this for you. You should request a travel advance two weeks before you leave. You can also buy the biggest part of the trip (usually airfare) through OSU's online reservation portal Concur on the travel homepage: <a href="https://osutravel.osu.edu/">https://osutravel.osu.edu/</a></li> <li>If you have a low credit limit, you should think carefully about how to reserve hotel rooms and buy flights. Hotels almost always require you to put down a credit card to hold the room, and they typically charge it for the cost of the room + tax + ~$50 dollars in damages. That charge probably exceeds your credit limit if your limit is <$1k. If you're in this boat, you should definitely request the travel advance.</li> </ol> <p><u>If You're Travelling Internationally</u></p> <ul> <li><em>You must buy supplemental health insurance.</em> This is required by OSU travel as described in this link: <a href="https://oia.osu.edu/preparing-to-depart/health-insurance.html">https://oia.osu.edu/preparing-to-depart/health-insurance.html</a></li> <li><em>If you are travelling to a country that requires a Visa, start this process no later than 6 weeks in advance.</em> Visas take time to get, and are mad expensive you have to rush them (>$200). So don't, start this process ahead of time. The state department has this list: <a href="https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/general/americans-traveling-abroad.html">https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/general/americans-traveling-abroad.html</a> . Some destinations that require visas might surprise you (Australia, Brazil, China, parts of the Europe), so don't assume you don't need one.</li> <li>I attached an email with more information.</li> </ul> Encoding: HTML ELCode plain Suppress Email notification

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