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Travel (Missions)

This page gives rules and procedures for travel ("missions") paid by LEAR.

General Principles

  1. You should travel only when necessary, and as economically as reasonably possible.
  2. All major expenses for a trip must be approved in advance with a signed Ordre de Mission form.
  3. We only reimburse the minimum of: (i) real costs that you have actually incurred; (ii) the daily forfait; (iii) costs that we consider to be "reasonable" and commensurate with your usual living standards at home.

Hence, you should:

Before the Trip

To make sure that everything is clear and that nobody has any unpleasant surprises, we ask you to provide a detailed budget for each trip. Email this to Cordelia and Bill and bring a printed copy with the Ordre de Mission form when you come to get this signed. It should include itemized estimates for all costs that you plan to claim, including (but not limited to) :

The website where you can monitor your trips is https://izi.inria.fr/tiki-index.php.

Choosing Flights and Trains

In principle, we only reimburse the cost of the cheapest advance purchase fare. Also, INRIA will not reimburse more than the cost of the best fare found by their official travel agent Carlsson Wagonlit, so we always need to get an official proposition from Carlsson even if you don't use it.

You can book your flights yourself if you want to, but if you book through INRIA and Carlsson you will avoid having to pay yourself and be reimbursed later.

Experience shows that the following procedure causes the least hassle for everybody :

Choosing Hotels and Restaurants

One of the major benefits of trips and conferences is that they allow you to meet and build up links with other members of the community. This is part of your job on any trip and we expect you to make an active effort towards it. Hence, your budget should be large enough to allow you to eat casual meals with interesting colleagues, and your hotel shouldn't be so far from the centre of activity that you can't do this. However, this only stretches to casual meals and economical hotels. If you choose to eat in fancy restaurants or stay in luxury hotels, it is at your own expense. If no suitable budget accomodation is available, we do expect you to save money by sharing a room wherever possible.

While Travelling

Make sure that you get official receipts for conference registration (this should be in your registration envelope - if not, ask!), accommodation, airport coaches, taxis, etc.

After the Trip

Add up your total incurred costs, write on the expenses form (A5 sized sheet) "Je demande le remboursement forfaitaire de XXX euros pour cette mission", sign the form, and give it to Anne. If your costs were larger than expected, you will need to justify any large items to Cordelia or Bill and get approval for the increase.

Further administrative information