Do this job with AI
Turn a long policy into a staff briefing that doesn't change the rules
Written by AI Tools AcademyLast checked on 27 September 2026
Helpful first: Hallucination and trust · How to verify AI answers
Practice files for this page
Fernway Expenses and Travel Policy, version 4 (fictional) (Markdown, 4 pages)
Fictional practice data. No real people or organisations.
This scenario uses a fictional four-page policy with role-based rules, an exception that's easy to lose, a transition date and four changes from the last version. Download it, follow the steps and compare your briefing with the finished version.
Fernway Expenses and Travel Policy, version 4 (Markdown, 4 pages, about 1,200 words)
Fictional policy. The rates and rules are invented and are not tax or HR guidance.
Fictional practice data. No real people or organisations.
Show the full policy (about 1,200 words)
Version: 4. Effective date: Thursday 1 October 2026. Replaces: Version 3 (effective 1 April 2025). Policy owner: Dan Okafor, Finance.
1. Purpose and scope. 1.1 This policy explains which business expenses Fernway Group will repay, the limits that apply and how to claim. 1.2 It applies to all employees. Contractors and agency staff claim under their own contract. 1.3 Home-working equipment is covered by the Hybrid and Remote Working Policy.
2. What has changed from version 3. 2.1 Claims must now be submitted within 60 days of the date the expense was incurred. Version 3 allowed 90 days. 2.2 Alcohol is no longer repaid as part of meals or subsistence. It is repaid only as part of approved client entertainment under section 9. 2.3 All claims must be made through the online expenses form. Receipts sent by email are no longer accepted. 2.4 The nightly hotel limits in section 7 have increased: London from £140 to £160, and elsewhere from £95 to £110.
3. Moving from version 3 to version 4. 3.1 Expenses incurred before 1 October 2026 are covered by the rules in version 3. 3.2 However, any claim for an expense incurred before 1 October 2026 must be submitted by Friday 30 October 2026, even if the 90-day limit in version 3 would have allowed longer. Claims for pre-October expenses received after 30 October 2026 will not be paid.
4. General principles. 4.1 Only claim costs you have actually paid, wholly for Fernway business. 4.2 Choose the most economical option that is reasonable. 4.3 An itemised receipt is required for every claim over £10. 4.4 If you lose a receipt, you may complete a lost receipt declaration in the expenses form. A declaration can cover a single expense of up to £25, and may be used no more than once in each calendar quarter. 4.5 Your line manager approves your claims. Finance checks every claim before payment.
5. Travel by car. 5.1 Mileage in your own car is repaid at 40p per mile for the first 8,000 business miles in the financial year (April to March), and 25p per mile after that. 5.2 Commuting (travel between your home and your usual workplace) cannot be claimed. 5.3 Employees whose contract names their home as their work base may claim all business mileage from home. A journey from home to head office or the Midlands depot counts as business mileage for field-based staff. 5.4 Every mileage claim must show the date, the start and end postcodes, the purpose of the journey and, for customer visits, the customer's name. 5.5 For any single business journey of more than 250 miles in total, book a hire car through the Office Manager, Maya Roberts, instead of using your own car, unless your line manager agrees otherwise in advance. 5.6 Parking and tolls are repaid with a receipt. Parking fines, speeding fines and other penalties are never repaid.
6. Public transport and taxis. 6.1 Rail travel is standard class. First class only with prior approval from the Head of Operations, Priya Shah, or where it is cheaper than standard class and you keep evidence of both fares. 6.2 Book rail tickets in advance where you can. 6.3 Taxis may be claimed only where there is no reasonable public transport, you are travelling after 9pm, or your line manager has agreed taxi use as a reasonable adjustment because of a disability or health condition.
7. Overnight stays. 7.1 An overnight stay may be booked when a business commitment starts before 9am or finishes after 6pm, and the place is more than two hours' drive from your home or usual workplace. 7.2 Book through the Office Manager where possible. 7.3 Maximum room rate per night, excluding breakfast: London £160; everywhere else £110. 7.4 Breakfast may be claimed up to £12 if not included in the room rate. 7.5 Exception: you may exceed the nightly limit only with prior written approval from the Head of Operations, where no suitable room is available within the limit (for example during a large event in the area). Keep the approval with your claim.
8. Meals and subsistence. 8.1 You may claim up to £12 for food and non-alcoholic drink when you are away from your usual work base on business for more than five hours. 8.2 Field-based employees working within their normal sales territory cannot claim day subsistence. They may claim under 8.1 when working outside their normal territory for more than five hours. 8.3 On an overnight stay you may claim up to £30 for an evening meal, covering food and non-alcoholic drink only. 8.4 Alcohol is not repaid under this section.
9. Client entertainment. 9.1 Only the Managing Director, the Sales Lead and Account Managers may claim client entertainment. 9.2 It must be approved in advance by the Sales Lead, Tom Elliott. The Sales Lead's own client entertainment is approved by the Managing Director, Erin Vaughan. 9.3 The limit is £40 per head, including Fernway staff present. 9.4 Alcohol may be included within the £40 per head limit. 9.5 Record the names of all guests, their organisation and the business purpose.
10. Gifts to customers. 10.1 Gifts must be approved in advance by the Sales Lead and must not exceed £25 per customer organisation per calendar year. 10.2 Cash and vouchers exchangeable for cash must never be given.
11. Submitting a claim. 11.1 Submit claims through the online expenses form within 60 days of the date the expense was incurred. 11.2 Claims approved by your line manager by the 20th of the month are paid in that month's payroll; claims approved after the 20th are paid the following month. 11.3 The Finance Assistant, Grace Lynch, may ask for more information before approving payment.
12. Late claims. 12.1 Claims submitted more than 60 days after the expense was incurred will not be paid. 12.2 The only exception is where Finance (Dan Okafor) agrees there were exceptional circumstances, for example a long period of sickness absence. Ask before submitting.
13. Misuse. Claiming expenses not incurred, or not for business, may be treated as a disciplinary matter.
14. Questions. To Dan Okafor or Grace Lynch in Finance.
Step 1: Understand the task
The briefing has one audience: field-based account managers. They drive a lot, stay overnight sometimes, take customers to lunch and claim expenses every month. They don't need the section on home-working equipment, and they definitely need the rule about subsistence inside their own territory.
The briefing also has one constraint that outranks readability: it mustn't change the policy. Every limit, date, approver and exception it mentions must match the source, and it should point back to the policy for anything it leaves out. A briefing that's easier to read but says something the policy doesn't is worse than no briefing, because people will act on it.
Step 2: Decide whether AI is appropriate
Good fit, with a strict check. Picking the relevant parts of a long document for a named audience is a strength of these tools. The known weakness is that when they summarise rules, they tend to smooth them: exceptions get dropped because they make sentences longer, and plausible-sounding rules from other organisations' policies can slip in.
Use AI for the first cut. Check every sentence against a clause number.
Step 3: Assess the data
An internal expenses policy is usually low risk. There's no personal data and nothing commercially sensitive about most of it. It is still an internal document, so use your work-approved tool by default.
Two things would change that. If the policy were marked confidential, or it included named individuals' circumstances (a specific person's agreed adjustment, for example), treat it as higher risk and follow your organisation's rules. Your organisation's policy and approved tools still take priority.
Step 4: Prepare the input
Paste or upload the whole policy, with its clause numbers. The numbers are what let you check the output quickly, and they give readers somewhere to look things up.
Describe the audience in a sentence the AI can work with: "field-based account managers whose contracts name home as their base, who drive to customers, sometimes stay overnight, and entertain clients". Without this, the AI can't know that section 8.2 is the most important clause in the document for them.
Step 5: Choose an approach or tool
Any general assistant can do this from a pasted or uploaded document. If your organisation uses Microsoft 365 Copilot and the policy is on SharePoint, you can usually point Copilot at the file instead of pasting it, depending on your licence and your organisation's settings. The instruction and the checks are the same in every tool, so there are no separate tool notes for this one.
The tool matters less than the instruction to stay inside the text.
Step 6: Write the instruction
Weak
Summarise this expenses policy for the sales team.
Better
Using only this policy, write a one-page briefing for field-based account managers. Include only what applies to them. Keep every exception, limit, date and approver exactly as written, and give the clause number for each point. Don't add any rule that isn't in the policy. List anything unclear as a question for Finance.
Why it works: It grounds the output in the text, names the audience, protects the details that usually get lost and gives the AI somewhere to put uncertainty.
Grounding means telling the AI to use only the document you've supplied, not its general knowledge of how expenses policies usually work. It won't make invention impossible, but it reduces it, and the clause numbers make any invention easy to spot.
Using only the policy below, write a briefing of no more than one page for [audience, e.g. field-based account managers who drive to customers, sometimes stay overnight and entertain clients]. Include only the rules that apply to them. Start with what has changed and any transition dates. Keep every exception, limit, date and approver exactly as written. Put the clause number after each point. Don't add rules, advice or interpretation that isn't in the policy. If something relevant is unclear, list it at the end as a question for [policy owner]. [paste policy]
Why this works: Clause numbers turn a long check into a quick one.
Step 7: Inspect the answer
This is the kind of answer the weak instruction can produce. It's short, readable and confident.
New expenses rules from 1 October 2026: what you need to know
- Submit all claims within 60 days using the online expenses form. Receipts must be uploaded within 7 days of the expense.
- Mileage is paid at 40p per mile, dropping to 25p after 8,000 miles.
- Hotels: up to £160 a night in London and £110 elsewhere.
- Subsistence: claim up to £12 when you're away for more than five hours.
- Evening meals on overnight stays: up to £30.
- Client entertainment: up to £40 per head with approval from your manager.
- Alcohol is no longer reimbursed.
- To be safe, submit your claims weekly.
Put a clause number next to each line yourself. Any line you can't number is either invented or interpreted.
Step 8: Identify likely errors
The other problems, clause by clause:
- "Alcohol is no longer reimbursed" drops the exception in 2.2 and 9.4: alcohol is allowed within approved client entertainment. That's the one place account managers need to know about.
- "Approval from your manager" for client entertainment is vague. Clause 9.2 names Tom Elliott, and says it must be in advance.
- "Submit your claims weekly" is advice the AI made up. It may be sensible, but it isn't policy, and it's presented as if it were.
- Missing: the transition deadline (3.2). Anything spent before 1 October must be claimed by Friday 30 October. Missing: the hotel exception (7.5), the 250-mile hire car rule (5.5), mileage from home for field-based staff (5.3), gifts (10.1).
- Mileage is right on the rates but leaves out that the 8,000 miles count per financial year.
Step 9: Correct the result
Ask for the evidence and the missing pieces in one follow-up.
For every line in your briefing, quote the clause it comes from. Remove any line with no supporting clause. Then check the policy for any exceptions or role-specific rules for field-based staff, and for transition dates, and add any you left out, with clause numbers.
Why this works: Anything without a clause number is exposed immediately.
Then check it yourself, clause by clause, with the policy open alongside. Two things need your judgement, because the policy doesn't settle them:
- What counts as "normal sales territory"? The policy doesn't define it. If Alex Doyle (Midlands) covers a South customer while Sam Price is on leave, is that outside his territory? Don't let the AI answer that. Put it to Dan.
- The effective date and transition date. Check both in the source: Thursday 1 October 2026 and Friday 30 October 2026. Dates are where small slips are hardest to notice.
Step 10: Produce the finished work
Show the finished version
Expenses and travel from Thursday 1 October 2026: what account managers need to know
Based on the Expenses and Travel Policy, version 4. If this briefing and the policy ever differ, the policy is correct. Clause numbers in brackets.
What's changed
- Claim within 60 days of the expense (it was 90). Late claims aren't paid unless Dan Okafor agrees exceptional circumstances; ask before submitting (2.1, 12).
- All claims go through the online expenses form. Emailed receipts are no longer accepted (2.3).
- Alcohol is no longer repaid with meals or subsistence. It's only allowed within approved client entertainment (2.2, 9.4).
- Hotel limits are up: £160 a night in London, £110 elsewhere (2.4, 7.3).
Spent something before 1 October? Version 3 rules apply, but you must claim it by Friday 30 October 2026 or it won't be paid (3.2).
Mileage
- 40p a mile for the first 8,000 business miles in the financial year (April to March), then 25p (5.1).
- If your contract names home as your base, all business mileage from home counts, including trips to head office or the Midlands depot (5.3).
- Log the date, start and end postcodes, purpose and customer name for every journey (5.4).
- A single journey over 250 miles in total: book a hire car through Maya Roberts, unless your manager agrees otherwise in advance (5.5).
- Parking and tolls with a receipt. Fines are never repaid (5.6).
Overnight stays
- Allowed when you start before 9am or finish after 6pm, more than two hours' drive from your home or usual workplace (7.1). Book through Maya where possible (7.2).
- Over the nightly limit only with Priya Shah's written approval in advance, when nothing suitable is available within it (7.5).
- Breakfast up to £12 if not included. Evening meal up to £30, no alcohol (7.4, 8.3).
Day subsistence
- Not claimable when you're working within your normal sales territory. Outside your territory for more than five hours: up to £12 (8.1, 8.2).
Customers
- Client entertainment: approved in advance by Tom Elliott, up to £40 a head including you, alcohol allowed within that. Record guests' names, organisations and the purpose (9).
- Gifts: approved in advance by Tom, no more than £25 per customer organisation per calendar year. Never cash or cash-type vouchers (10).
Receipts and payment
- Itemised receipt for anything over £10. Lost it? One declaration per quarter, up to £25 (4.3, 4.4).
- Claims your manager approves by the 20th are paid that month (11.2).
Questions: Dan Okafor or Grace Lynch.
Questions for Dan before this goes out (not for the team)
- How is "normal sales territory" defined for 8.2? For example, Alex covering a South customer during Sam's leave.
- Does "a single business journey of more than 250 miles" in 5.5 mean one day's driving, or a multi-day trip?
Step 11: Reflect: did AI actually save time?
Yes, probably. Reading four pages and picking out one audience's rules takes real time, and the AI's first cut, even with its errors, gave you a structure to check against. The clause-number follow-up made checking quicker than writing from scratch.
The time saving depends entirely on the check. Without it, you'd have saved twenty minutes and sent a briefing that gave the account managers a wrong rule about subsistence, a rule that doesn't exist about receipts and no warning about the 30 October deadline. Fixing that after it's been quoted in a sales meeting takes longer than the briefing did.
Common mistakes
- Trusting a summary because it sounds like a policy. The invented 7-day receipt rule is convincing because it sounds like a normal expenses rule. Sounding right isn't evidence. Find the clause.
- Losing exceptions to make it shorter. Exceptions are often the most important part for a specific audience. If the AI's version is suspiciously clean, look for the "except" and "unless" clauses in the source.
- Letting interpretation pass as policy. "Submit weekly to be safe" might be good advice. If you want to include it, label it as a tip and keep it separate from the rules.
- Not checking dates. Effective dates and transition deadlines are easy to mistype and hard to spot. Check each against the source.
- Writing for everyone. A briefing "for all staff" becomes the whole policy again. Name one audience, and write a separate briefing for others.
- Not saying the policy wins. Include one line saying the policy is the authority if the two differ. It protects the reader and you.