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How to Catch Out‑of‑Policy Project Expenses Before They Happen

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Last Updated On
June 20, 2025
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In this Article

In this Article

It’s Friday afternoon, and your finance team just found another out-of-policy expense buried in someone's report. Maybe it's a $600 supply purchase without pre-approval, or fuel bought on a weekend with no receipts. These surprises don’t just hurt your wallet, they undermine trust in your cost reports.

In construction, the issue is real — tight budgets, shifting priorities, and field teams who aren’t always thinking about policy. By the time violations are found, damages are done: budgets are overspent, clean-up takes time, and your financial data is unreliable.

That’s why Fyle built real-time policy enforcement. Instead of reviewing reports after the spend, Fyle checks compliance up front — when the transaction is logged. If something’s off, the employee and approver are alerted immediately. No surprises. No overspend.

65% of finance professionals spend over an hour reviewing each monthly expense report due to errors and inefficiency
American Express on the hidden costs of inefficient expense reporting

Why Real-Time Policy Enforcement Matters In Construction

In fast-paced environments like construction, spend decisions are made on the go. A foreman grabs supplies. A crew lead books last-minute travel. A supervisor fills up fuel.

But when policies aren’t enforced at the time of spend:

  • Budgets get exceeded without warning
  • Finance discovers issues too late to fix
  • Employees repeat mistakes without knowing they’ve broken policy

Manual reviews at month-end aren’t enough. You need a system that flags violations before they become problems.

Over 50% of expense-related frauds happen due to weak or nonexistent policy enforcement
ACFE: Weak policy enforcement causes over half of all expense fraud cases

How Fyle Enforces Expense Policies In Real Time

Fyle lets you set custom expense policies — then enforces them automatically when expenses are created, submitted, or reviewed.

Fyle app showing a policy violation alert after scanning a receipt

Here’s How It Works

  • An employee submits or logs an expense
  • Fyle checks the entry against your company’s rules (like amount limits, merchant restrictions, missing receipts, etc.)
  • If a violation is detected, the expense is flagged instantly and a message is shown to both the employee and the approver
  • Approvers can’t miss it: violations are highlighted visually in their dashboard
  • Finance can review all flagged expenses in a single place, along with reason, resolution, and audit trail

No delays. No missed flags. No back-and-forth at month-end.

Setting Up Policies In Fyle (It’s Flexible)

You can create multiple, layered policies in Fyle based on:

  • Amount limits (e.g., “Meals must be under $50”)
  • Merchant or category restrictions (e.g., block entertainment or personal expenses)
  • Receipt requirements (e.g., “Receipts required above $25” or “For hotel expenses”)
  • Mileage documentation rules
  • Role, project, department, or business unit

Each policy can be:

  • Applied to specific user groups, roles, or departments
  • Blocking (cannot submit) or non-blocking (warn and proceed)
  • Customized with explanations or exception handling (like allowing submission with justification)

Finance teams can view all policy violations in one place, with full context on who submitted them, what went wrong, and when it happened.

How 3CX describes their experience with Fyle

What This Looks Like In Practice

Fyle dashboard showing submitted expense reports with policy violation alerts highlighted for review

Let’s say a site supervisor logs a $700 supply purchase using a company card.

  • Fyle checks the category, vendor, and amount
  • If the purchase exceeds the pre-set limit for unapproved vendors
  • A violation is flagged instantly
  • The supervisor sees the warning and adds a justification
  • The report goes to the project manager with the violation clearly highlighted
  • Finance sees the full trail — no chasing, no surprises

Benefits For Construction Companies

  • Catch risky spend early – Know immediately if someone goes over-budget or breaks policy
  • Enforce rules automatically – No manual audits or policy policing
  • Give visibility to the right people – PMs and finance see violations as they happen]
  • Save time and avoid back-and-forth – No need to follow up for missing receipts or explanations
  • Stay compliant and audit-ready – Full violation logs and workflows are always tracked
How Citylight Lincoln Church describes their experience with Fyle

Ready To Stop Out-Of-Policy Spending Before It Starts?

Fyle helps construction finance teams catch issues early, while there’s still time to act. No more waiting until month-end to fix what could’ve been flagged at the time of spend.

Instead of finding mistakes during reconciliation, you can catch them the moment they happen, with clear visibility for everyone involved, from field staff to project managers to finance.

Whether it’s missing receipts, overspending, or category restrictions, Fyle flags it, explains it, and helps your team fix it on the spot.

Effortless expense management for all business spends. Earned time, saved costs, improved productivity, happy employees - achieve it all with a single software.

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