Despite the financial meltdown, people working in the financial services sector made three times as many expense claims for entertaining than the average UK worker in 2008, according to new research. The figures show that 22% of all approved expenses claims made by people in the financial services sector during 2008 were for entertaining, compared with 7% for the average UK worker. The survey also showed that the average value of each of these claims was £136, up from £129 the year before. By comparison, UK workers across all industries made average claims of £83.15. Women made fewer claims as a proportion of their overall number of claims (5%) for entertainment than men (8.5%), the figures reveal.

Company policy on expenses is also being widely flouted. The company reveals that 11% of claims (worth approximately £1bn across the UK economy in 2008) approved by line managers did not comply with their organisation’s policy on expenses.

The figures, revealed exclusively here, are contained in the 2009 GlobalExpense Employee Expense Benchmark Report, which is said to be the biggest analysis of expense claims of its kind. The research draws on more than 4.8 million expense claims from more than 150,000 UK-based employees during 2007 and 2008.

David Vine of GlobalExpense, the company behind the report, said: “With the economy slowing throughout 2008 and clearly tipping into recession from the autumn…we were expecting to see expense costs to reduce compared to 2007, particularly in some of the sectors most affected such as financial services and retail.”

However, this prediction is at odds with the report’s findings. The study shows that the average approved claim during 2008 was for around £58 and that the average expense-claiming employee received £1,736 during 2008 (up around 12% from £1,555 in 2007).

Vine added: “Business travellers will be under enormous pressure in 2009 to achieve the same results as previous years but spend less, as companies struggle to control costs during a recession.”

The survey also looked at expenditure on business hotels. Russia emerged as the country with the most expensive hotels, with an average price of £252.95 per night. Denmark was the second most expensive at £245.87, followed by Norway at £233.98 and then the UAE at £244.98. The Isle of Man had on average the cheapest hotel rooms at £88.40 followed by the UK. Overall, the average cost of a night in a UK hotel room fell by 2.5% to £88.93 per night.