Charging Back an Expense: The New Recovery Model

When your property pays for something that should really be billed to a resident or owner (a repair they caused, a service tied to their unit), you can charge it back to them. This guide covers what changed, how to set it up, and what the person you're charging sees.

What changed, and why

Charging an expense back used to work as a "pass-through": the amount you recovered was subtracted from the same expense account the cost was booked to, so your books never showed it as income.

Now, charging an expense back posts the recovered amount to a dedicated revenue account instead. The expense still shows its full cost on your books, and the amount you recover from the resident or owner shows up separately as revenue. Your reports are more accurate this way: you can see what something cost you and what you recovered from it, side by side, instead of one number quietly offsetting the other.

Nothing about expenses that were already charged back before this update changes. They keep working and displaying exactly as they did.

How to charge back an expense

1. Open the expense from Accounting > Expenses. The expense must already be approved.

2. In the expense drawer, turn on the Pass-through charge toggle.

3. Choose who to charge: search for the resident, owner, or unit the cost belongs to.

4. Pick the Revenue account the recovered amount should post to. URBI prefills this with your property's default recovery account (named Expense Recovery Revenue unless you've changed it), so in most cases you can leave it as-is. Pick a different account only if this particular charge needs to post somewhere else.

5. Set a Handling fee if you want to add a percentage on top, and a due date (or leave it to use the default).

6. Choose how the charge should be approved (see below), then click Create charge-back to confirm.

You can change your property's default recovery account any time in Accounting Settings > Reporting Basis, in the box just below the security deposit account. Leaving it blank is fine too: URBI automatically falls back to your property's Expense Recovery Revenue account.

Choosing how the charge gets approved

Every charge-back has an approval mode:

• Require approval (the default): the resident or owner gets a notification and has to approve the charge before it's invoiced. If nobody on the account is able to approve it, URBI automatically bills it directly instead, so the charge is never left stuck waiting on someone who can't act on it.
• Skip approval, bill directly: the charge is invoiced right away, due on receipt, with no approval step.

Whichever mode you use, charging an expense back never automatically charges a saved card. The person being charged always has to choose to pay, the same as any other bill, unless they've separately turned on their own autopay.

Turning on auto-approval (optional)

If you'd rather not wait indefinitely for someone to respond, you can turn on auto-approval for an individual charge when Require approval is selected. Pick a date the charge should auto-approve if nobody has acted by then, using the +14 days or +30 days shortcuts, or your own date. The date has to be at least 7 days out, so residents and owners always get a minimum notice window.

Before that date arrives, URBI sends the resident or owner a reminder about a week out, and a second reminder in the last 24 hours, so the auto-approval date is never a surprise. If nobody has approved or rejected the charge by the date you set, URBI approves and invoices it automatically and lets them know it happened. Just like every other charge-back, this never auto-charges a saved card: it simply becomes due like any other bill.

Sharing the source invoice

Turn on Share source invoice when you want the resident or owner to be able to see the original vendor invoice or receipt behind the charge, not just the amount. When it's on, they'll see a View source invoice button:

• On their approval request and on the invoice afterward, in the mobile app.
• On the pending-approval card and the invoice detail page, in the web portal.

If you leave it off, they see the charge and the amount, but not the underlying document. This is a per-charge setting, so you can decide case by case whether the backing invoice should be visible.

Canceling a charge-back

If you need to cancel a charge-back, open it and click Cancel charge, then confirm on the "Cancel this charge-back?" prompt. This cannot be undone.

If the charge-back was still waiting on approval (including one with auto-approval running), canceling it withdraws the pending charge immediately: the resident or owner can no longer approve it, and it will not come back later and approve itself, even if the countdown was already running.

Good to know

• Charging an expense back never changes anything about the expense itself: the full cost still shows on the expense's own account, and the amount recovered is a separate transaction against the revenue account.
• Every approval, auto-approval, reminder, and cancellation is recorded in your accounting audit log, so you have a full record if a charge is ever questioned.
• Charge-backs from before this update are untouched. They keep working and displaying exactly as they always have.
• Charging an expense back never auto-charges a saved card, no matter which approval mode or auto-approval setting you use.