WWAMI Student Travel

Travel process

ONLINE REIMBURSEMENT SUBMISSION

Submit a reimbursement request online here.

A BRIEF OVERVIEW OF WWAMI STUDENT TRAVEL:
Here is the basic framework of travel at the University of Washington. It is important to remember that there are no special rules for medical students; there is just one set of rules for people traveling on UW business. If the UW travel rules create inconveniences for you, it will be up to you to adjust your plans, because the UW will not make exceptions for you. The School of Medicine obeys the UW’s travel policies and there is nobody at the School of Medicine with the authority to overrule UW travel policies.

  1. Everyone doing UW business (including staff, faculty, and students) must be in what’s called “travel status” in order for the UW to pay any travel costs.
  2. “Travel status” means that you leave your official duty station on UW business (including required clinical rotations). You must have an official duty station in order to leave it, otherwise you are never in “travel status.”
  3. Everyone doing UW business has an official duty station. This is determined not by where you live, but by where you have official duties per UW policy.
  4. There are, for School of Medicine students, only two possible official duty stations:
    1. An official Track site for students in Track program (“safari” is not a track, but LIC Olympia is), or
    2. Seattle
  5. Your official duty station (“home base” is not a meaningful term under UW travel policies) is either a Track site or Seattle. For most students, Seattle is their official duty station.
  6. You are responsible for your own housing costs at your official duty station.
  7. You are responsible for your own transportation to/from clinical clerkship sites except when: a) you are a non-Alaska Track student taking a required clerkship in Alaska, and b) you are an Alaska Track student taking a required clerkship outside of Alaska. In those cases, the School will pay for airfare and a rental car. Otherwise, you will need to provide your own vehicle at your own expense (aside from fuel costs; see next item).
  8. When you leave your official duty station for a required clinical clerkship, the School is allowed to pay you mileage if you drive your own car to the clinical site, or we will book airfare for you to travel there. The School pays mileage at the rate of 30.55 cents/mile, to offset fuel costs. The School does not reimburse at the Federal mileage rate, which is designed to also offset wear and tear on personal vehicles used in lieu of publicly owned vehicles. The School does not reimburse any other travel expenses.
  9. If you take a required clinical clerkship away from your official duty station, the School will provide housing for you or, if the School cannot arrange housing, will reimburse housing you arrange on your own. There are rules about when you can find your own housing and how much the School can pay.
  10. The School doesn’t pay any of your living expenses except for housing costs away from your official duty station. Food, laundry, entertainment, etc are all your personal responsibility.

BEFORE THE CLERKSHIP:
If you have a required clinical clerkship away from your official duty station, you will receive an email from the WWAMI CLERKSHIP TRAVEL account (gowwami@uw.edu) six weeks ahead of the first day of the clerkship. This email will have instructions about arranging airfare if your clerkship is in Alaska, and a few general instructions about travel otherwise. If you do not need the School to purchase airfare for you, you do not need to reply to this email.

DURING THE CLERKSHIP:
If you needed to stay overnight at a hotel during your travel to your clerkship site per item #3 above, you can immediately request reimbursement for up to $80 of the lodging cost by submitting a reimbursement request through our form here. Note that the UW Central Travel Office will reject smartphone photos of receipts, so please scan the receipt (at a minimum of 300 dpi resolution) and attach that scan to your email. Reimbursements take about two weeks to process.

If you travel to Seattle from your non-Seattle official duty station and have arranged your own lodging, you can immediately request reimbursement for up to $80/day of the lodging cost by submitting a reimbursement request through our form here. Reimbursements take about two weeks to process. NOTE: If you paid for your Seattle lodging in advance, you can request reimbursement even before the start of the clerkship. See here for more details about Seattle lodging for non-Seattle students.

If you traveled to Alaska and have baggage receipts, you can immediately request reimbursement for up to two checked bags by submitting a reimbursement request through our form here. Note that the UW Central Travel Office will reject smartphone photos of receipts, so please scan the receipt (at a minimum of 300 dpi resolution) and attach that scan to your email. Reimbursements take about two weeks to process.

If you traveled to Alaska and rented a car, note that the rental agencies usually charge your credit card once when you first rent the car (for the first four weeks of the rental), and again for the remaining two weeks when you return the vehicle. The UW Central Travel office only allows us to reimburse the rental car after it’s been returned. After returning the car and obtaining final receipts, please submit a reimbursement request through our form here. See here for the UW’s policies regarding car rental, and information about the UW’s Enterprise and National contracts.

AFTER THE CLERKSHIP:
It is up to you to request reimbursement through our form here. We no longer email students after the clerkship period is over.

Reimbursements will all be in the form of a paper check, sent either to whatever address you provide for us. The UW doesn’t have the ability to reimburse you in the form of a direct deposit.

A CAVEAT ABOUT THE EMAILS:
The process that generates the before and after clerkship emails described above uses data from the e*Value scheduling system, which has limits and peculiarities. e*Value doesn’t know about Track sites, it doesn’t know about official duty stations, and it doesn’t know about the UW’s travel policies. Sometimes the reports we generate from e*Value to initiate the emails to you about travel have misleading or missing data, so it is possible that despite our best efforts, you may not get one of the before or after clerkship emails. If that’s the case, please contact us at gowwami@uw.edu to arrange airfare.