Travel & Expenses Specialist

The role

The Travel & Expenses Specialist is responsible for the day-to-day execution and control of travel and expense processes for assigned populations or regions.

The role ensures that expense claims and corporate card transactions are reviewed and processed accurately and on time, in line with company policy, applicable local requirements and financial controls. The Specialist also brings hands-on corporate travel expertise, supporting employees with air and hotel bookings and travel-related issues, and applying practical knowledge of airfare structures, fare rules and booking systems. The Specialist performs assigned corporate card reconciliation activities, maintains accurate and audit-ready records, and identifies recurring issues, risks and opportunities to improve processes and controls.

The role combines strong operational execution with employee support, financial accuracy and control discipline, helping employees travel and get reimbursed efficiently while ensuring company spend is appropriately documented, coded and controlled.

Your responsibilities will include:

• Perform first-line review and audit of expense claims, ensuring accuracy and compliance with company policy, applicable requirements and documentation standards. Follow up on exceptions and missing information before claims progress through the approval process.
• Perform or support corporate travel bookings using the company travel booking environment and, where applicable, GDS tools, applying knowledge of airfare structures, fare rules, booking classes, routing options, ticketing conditions, changes, exchanges and cancellations.
• Support employees with corporate travel and expense queries, including air and hotel bookings, booking changes and cancellations, fare and routing questions, expense submissions, reimbursements and policy guidance. Resolve issues directly where appropriate and coordinate with travel providers or other teams for matters requiring escalation.
• Monitor corporate card transactions to ensure timely claiming, appropriate coding and clearance. Follow up on aged, unclaimed or incorrectly coded transactions and drive outstanding items to resolution.
• Perform assigned corporate card reconciliation activities, investigate reconciliation differences and follow up with relevant employees or stakeholders to ensure timely resolution and clearance.
• Validate expense coding and supporting documentation, including receipts and invoices, and identify recurring errors, exceptions or control gaps.
• Support country-specific expense and tax requirements, including invoice compliance and VAT recovery readiness where applicable.
• Support expense-related accounting activities, including accurate GL coding, accrual and reversal processes and clearing of expense balances.
• Monitor T&E system and process controls and identify configuration gaps, recurring errors or cases where controls are not operating as intended. Support testing and resolution with the appropriate system or process owners.
• Identify travel and expense cases that may require specialist review, including tax, payroll or duty-of-care considerations, and escalate them to the appropriate teams.
• Prepare and support recurring T&E operational reporting, including expense-processing, corporate-card, ageing, compliance and other relevant operational metrics.
• Use T&E data to identify trends, spend leakage, aged items, recurring issues and control gaps, and contribute to improvements in processes, controls and employee guidance.
• Support audit and control-testing requirements by maintaining complete, accurate and audit-ready T&E documentation and providing requested evidence.
• Work with relevant internal and external stakeholders, including Finance, Payroll, HR, Travel providers and T&E system vendors, to resolve operational issues and support continuous process improvement.

We expect you to have:

• 5+ years of experience in corporate travel, Travel & Expenses, travel operations, Accounts Payable or Finance Operations, preferably within an international or multi-entity environment.
• Experience reviewing and processing expense claims and applying policy, documentation and compliance requirements.
• Working knowledge of basic accounting principles, including GL coding, reconciliations and accrual concepts.
• Experience working with corporate card transactions and/or reconciliation processes.
• Experience working with a T&E or expense management system such as Expensify, Navan, SAP Concur, TravelPerk or a comparable platform.
• Hands-on experience using a GDS (e.g., Amadeus, Sabre or Travelport) for corporate travel booking and/or ticket servicing, with the ability to work confidently with availability, fares, booking classes and ticketing rules.
• Hands-on experience with corporate travel booking and servicing, including air and hotel bookings, fare structures, fare rules, booking classes, booking conditions, changes, exchanges and cancellations.
• Strong attention to detail and the ability to work accurately with high transaction volumes and recurring deadlines.
• Strong service orientation and the ability to resolve employee queries clearly and professionally while applying policy consistently.
• Good spreadsheet skills (Excel or Google Sheets), including the ability to identify anomalies, trends and exceptions in data.
• Ability to work within controlled processes and maintain accurate, complete and audit-ready documentation.

It will be an added bonus if you have:

• Exposure to VAT, invoice compliance or expense tax requirements in one or more countries.
• Experience working in an international, multi-country or multi-entity environment.
• Experience supporting financial close, balance-sheet reconciliation or audit activities.
• Experience preparing operational reporting and using T&E data to support process or control improvements.
• Experience with more advanced airfare analysis, complex itineraries, exchanges/refunds or GDS functionality beyond day-to-day booking and servicing.

Competencies & Behavioral Traits:

• Strong service orientation combined with sound policy and compliance judgment.
• Structured and organized, with the ability to manage recurring operational deadlines and follow-up activities.
• Strong attention to detail while maintaining awareness of broader process and control implications.
• Proactive problem-solving mindset; identifies recurring issues, follows exceptions through to resolution, escalates risks early and contributes to practical solutions.
• Clear communicator who can work effectively with employees and stakeholders across Finance, Payroll, HR and external providers.
• Comfortable working with data to identify exceptions, trends and opportunities for improvement.
• Able to distinguish between issues that can be resolved independently and those requiring escalation to specialist or process owners.
• High level of integrity and accountability when handling financial information and operating within controlled, audit-ready processes.