Preferred Booking Program (Direct Billing System)

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Welcome to the UC Davis Preferred Booking Program. This direct billing system can be used by employees booking airfare in AggieExpense, reserving local hotels, and reconciling catering through campus Olive & Vine Catering.

The Travel Itinerary Site offers BCD Travelers access to travel related documents for current and previous trips in one convenient site.

NOTE: The Preferred Booking Program (PBP) will be phased out by the end of calendar year 2025 and replaced by the Instant Card program.  More details will be posted in the coming months.

What Does It Cover?

The UC Davis Preferred Booking Program provides direct billing for airfare in AggieExpense, local hotel lodging, and campus catering Olive & Vine:
  • This program allows participating hotels in Davis, Winters, and Sacramento to charge lodging expenses directly to university employees using their own Preferred Booking Program account.
  • The Preferred Booking Program offers a direct billing option for university guests, and for those without a Travel card conducting official university business.

NOTE: The Preferred Booking Program is NOT used for hotel room rental expenses related to entertainment. The Travel Card should be used for entertainment.

Participating Hotels

The following hotels are currently part of the Preferred Booking Program. Refer to the instructions in the following section on how to complete the reservation form so that your reservation is properly processed.

Davis, CA Locations
  • Aggie Inn
  • Best Western - University Lodge
  • Best Western Plus - Palm Court Inn
  • Hilton Garden Inn
  • Hyatt House
  • Hyatt Place (UC Davis campus)
  • Residence Inn
  • University Park Inn & Suites
  • The Vine Inn
Sacramento Locations
  • Courtyard by Marriott
  • Fort Sutter Hotel
  • Hampton Inn & Suites
  • Home2Suites
  • Hyatt House (K Street)
  • Inn off Capitol Park
  • Residence Inn at Capitol Park
  • Residence Inn Northeast/CalExpo
Winters, CA Locations
  • Hotel Winters

Preferred Booking Program Hotel Reservation Instructions

1.  Contact hotel first to confirm availability.

2.  Complete the online Reservation Form (in Docusign):

  • On the form, enter the Coordinator’s information, Traveler’s information, hotel, and dates of stay.
  • Enter your Financial Department Approver or Department Head’s information, and DocuSign will route the guest reservation for pre-approval.
  • After approval, DocuSign will automatically route a completed copy of the form to the Coordinator, the Approver and to the selected hotel. 

NOTE: If an incorrect Traveler ID is entered, or if the hotel supplies an incorrect ID on the billing file, the transaction will not import and may require manual revision by the UC Davis Banking Card team. If the transaction does not import into AggieExpense within two weeks from date of departure, verify the Traveler ID and contact cardprogramhelp@ucdavis.edu for assistance.

Preferred Booking Program Olive & Vine Instructions

Campus catering Olive & Vine orders must be placed through their website, and the expenses will be automatically billed through the Preferred Booking Program.

Preferred Booking Program Airline Instructions

Airfare purchased directly through AggieExpense is automatically billed through the Preferred Booking Program.

Reconcile Transactions in AggieExpense

After a purchase is made using the Preferred Booking Program, the expenses import directly into AggieExpense, appearing in the Available Expenses list, and are identified by both the expense type and the mobile device icon.

The expenses also appear on the AggieExpense Unreconciled Expenses report in Cognos. 

  • These transactions should be reconciled in AggieExpense on an expense report within 60 calendar days of the trip or event end date. Refer to the AggieExpense Unreconciled Expenses report in Cognos for a list of transactions that are unreconciled.
  • Refer to the information further below on this page on what to do if the transactions do not appear in AggieExpense.

Managing Credits for Refunded Transactions

  • When a refund is issued for lodging or airfare booked through the Preferred Booking Program, the credit will automatically upload and display in AggieExpense.
  • Reconcile the credit as you did the original expense. An expense report can be submitted with a negative dollar amount for Preferred Booking Program credits.

Missing Preferred Booking Program Transactions: Non-Employees

  1. Before contacting the Travel Help Desk about missing Preferred Booking Program transactions, you must first confirm that the Non-Employee traveler has the correct traveler ID.
  2. If the traveler ID is not formatted as “N1000####” the first step is to create their profile using the Non-Employee Application.
  3. Confirm the correct Non-Employee AggieExpense traveler ID was used for the reservation.
  4. For local hotels, confirm the traveler ID is correct on both the Preferred Booking Program form and the hotel invoice.
  5. For airfare, confirm the traveler ID is correct on the airfare itinerary.
  6. If the Traveler ID is valid, email the Travel Help Desk:
    1. Subject line = Preferred Booking Program: [Traveler’s Name], [Traveler ID#].
    2. Attach = Airfare Itinerary or Local Hotel Preferred Booking Program  form corresponding to the missing transaction.
  7. If the wrong Traveler ID was used, email the Travel Help Desk:
    1. Subject line = Preferred Booking Program : [Traveler’s Name], [Traveler ID#] (Use the correct ID here)
    2. In the email, note the incorrect ID that was used, and the correct ID that should be used. If the expense has not been imported into another (incorrect) profile, the Travel card team will import the transaction into the correct traveler’s profile.
    3. Attach = Airfare Itinerary or Local Hotel Preferred Booking Program form corresponding to the missing transaction.

Unreconciled Preferred Booking Program Transactions

June 2025: See the Unreconciled Preferred Booking Program page for information on the Cognos report being discontinued and ad-hoc reports available at this time.

Unreconciled Preferred Booking Program expenses which have not been added to an AggieExpense report for over 1 year are no longer available for reconciliation.

These expenses were already charged to the department account when originally imported. As a reminder, all expenses must be reconciled in AggieExpense within 60 days of the trip or event end date. 

If there is a need to change the charge account for a direct billed expense that is no longer available in AggieExpense due to its age, please complete an Aggie Enterprise Journal Voucher document. Please note: a Journal should only be processed when the transaction is no longer available in AggieExpense. 

For more information about the Journal process, see the instructional guide.