Managing Driver Trip Expenses in Logistics

When a truck driver in Turkey sets off from Istanbul to Mersin, they carry a cash advance, a few photos on their phone and crumpled receipts in the glovebox. When the trip ends, the finance team is left with the same questions: where did the money go, is there a receipt, and which trip does it belong to? This article explains how logistics companies can manage driver trip expenses from the trip advance to the accounting entry: typical expense items, how advances are issued and settled, a sample journal entry, a checklist and how the process works in Masraff.

What do driver trip expenses consist of?

Driver trip expenses are the meals, accommodation, parking, road fees and emergency repairs a driver pays out of pocket or from the trip advance during a trip. The items vary by route, but the table below will look familiar to most companies.

Fuel cards and electronic toll systems (HGS and OGS in Turkey) usually arrive as a separate statement with their own reconciliation process. This article focuses on the expenses a driver pays in person during the trip and has to bring the receipt for.

Why is expense tracking harder in logistics?

Expense tracking is harder in logistics because the person spending the money is away from the office for days and the receipts stay with the driver until the trip ends. A few typical problems stand out:

• Lost receipts: Receipts printed on thermal paper fade over time, and some simply get lost in the cab.
• Late documents: Drivers leave for the next trip as soon as they return, so receipts are not handed in until month-end.
• Spending that cannot be tied to a trip: Without a trip number or plate on the receipt, it is unclear which trip's cost the expense belongs to.
• Open advances: At the end of the trip, nobody is sure how much of the advance was spent and how much should come back.
• Duplicate claims: The same receipt is handed in on paper and also sent as a photo.

The common fix for all of these is recording the expense at the moment it is incurred, together with the trip information.

How is a trip advance issued and closed?

A trip advance is paid against an approved request before the trip and closed afterwards by offsetting it against the expenses the driver claims. The difference is either recovered from the driver or paid to the driver.

A working advance routine looks like this:

1. Before the trip, the driver opens an advance request with the trip details.
2. The fleet or operations manager approves it and the payment is made.
3. During the trip, the driver enters expenses with a photo of each receipt.
4. When the trip ends, the expenses are matched against the advance and the remaining balance is visible.
5. The difference is returned or paid to the driver, and the advance is closed.

Keeping domestic and international trip advances as separate types makes currency and balance tracking easier. We cover the basics of the advance process in our guide to employee advance management.

How are driver expenses recorded in the books?

In Turkey, driver expenses are booked under the Uniform Chart of Accounts (Tekdüzen Hesap Planı) using account 195 Job Advances for the advance, class-7 expense accounts for the cost and account 191 for deductible VAT. The figures below are an example.

Example: A driver receives a trip advance of TRY 8,000. During the trip they bring back a parking receipt of TRY 120 including 20% VAT. All expenses, including parking, total TRY 6,350; the remaining TRY 1,650 is returned to the company.

Which class-7 account the cost goes to depends on the company's cost structure: companies that track trip costs as cost of services use a different account from those that book them under 760 or 770. When no advance is paid, the amount owed to the driver is tracked in the 195/320 employee account.

Legal basis: In Turkey, an expense must be supported by a document to be deductible (Tax Procedure Law No. 213, Article 227; Official Gazette 10.01.1961). Under Article 253 of the same law, documents are kept for 5 years starting from the year after the year they relate to. The tax treatment of daily allowances paid to drivers is set out in Articles 24 and 27 of Income Tax Law No. 193 (Official Gazette 06.01.1961). Confirm how this applies to your company with your financial advisor (mali müşavir).

What should a driver expense policy include?

A driver expense policy should state clearly which items are covered, the daily limits, the receipt rule and the deadline for submission. A short policy is one that drivers actually read and follow. For a starting draft, you can use our expense policy template.

Checklist:

• Are the covered expense items listed one by one?
• Is there a daily meal limit, and is it multiplied by the number of trip days?
• Does the policy require accommodation invoices in the company's legal name?
• Is it clear how spending without a receipt is handled?
• Does it say how many days after the trip expenses must be entered?
• Is a trip number or plate mandatory on every expense?
• Are the deadline and method for returning advances defined?
• Are exchange-rate and receipt rules for international trips written separately?

How does it work in Masraff?

Masraff brings driver trip expenses together in one flow, from the advance request to the accounting entry. You can see the overall picture on the Masraff solution page for logistics companies.

• Mobile apps: Drivers enter expenses in the mobile app, downloaded from the App Store, Google Play or Huawei AppGallery, by taking a photo of the receipt. Artificial intelligence receipt scanning moves the details on the receipt into the expense fields.
• Advance Request & Settlement: The driver requests the trip advance through Masraff; the approved advance is offset against the expenses entered and the balance is tracked in real time. Subtypes such as domestic, international and business advance can be defined separately, each with its own account, approval flow and expense policy.
• Expense Policy Engine: Category-based, daily and monthly limits are defined. When a day field is enabled on the form, a daily meal limit, for example, can be applied according to the number of days. When a limit is exceeded, the system can just show a warning or block the expense.
• Trip information: With the Project Code, Tag and Custom Field fields, a trip number or plate can be added to every expense and made mandatory.
• Controls: The Duplicate Check stops the same expense from being claimed twice. The Last Expense Acceptance Day and period closing limit late documents.
• Accounting: With Detailed VAT Determination, each receipt is split across expense, VAT and employee accounts. Masraff integrates with more than 20 ERP and accounting systems.

You can read about a fleet operator using Masraff in the global fleet operator case study. We describe what makes an app drivers will actually use in our article on mobile-first expense apps.

Frequently asked questions

How do logistics companies track driver expenses?

Logistics companies track driver expenses best at the moment of spending, through a mobile app and together with the trip details. That way the receipt is recorded before it gets lost and is matched against the advance at the end of the trip.

Which account is used for a driver's trip advance?

In Turkey, a driver's trip advance is tracked in account 195 Job Advances of the Uniform Chart of Accounts. The account is credited and closed as expenses are claimed.

Can a driver expense with a lost receipt be deducted?

In Turkey, spending without a document is generally not accepted as a deductible expense, because the Tax Procedure Law requires proof by document. For these cases, company policy and your financial advisor's view decide.

What should you look for in a logistics card or expense app?

When choosing a logistics card or expense app, look at mobile receipt capture, advance settlement, trip-level fields and ERP export. Whether drivers can enter an expense in a few steps decides whether the app gets used consistently.