[$250] Expense - Unable to merge workspace distance expense with IOU distance expense

[lanitochka17]

If you haven’t already, check out our contributing guidelines for onboarding and email contributors@expensify.com to request to join our Slack channel!

---

Version Number: 9.2.59-0
Reproducible in staging?: Y
Reproducible in production?: Y
If this was caught during regression testing, add the test name, ID and link from TestRail: #71675
Email or phone of affected tester (no customers): sdsdjoidnsodjos2@gmail.com
Issue reported by: Applause - Internal Team

Action Performed:

1. Go to staging.new.expensify.com
2. Open 1:1 DM
3. Create a distance expense
4. Go to workspace chat
5. Create a distance expense
6. Open the expense report
7. Click More > Merge
8. Select IOU distance expense > Continue
9. Select Merchant and Report from the IOU expense
10. Click Continue
11. Click Merge expenses
12. Open workspace chat and 1:1 DM where distance expenses were created

Expected Result:

The distance expenses will be merged successfully

Actual Result:

Workspace distance expense cannot be merged with IOU distance expense
The original distance expenses remain after merging distance expenses

Workaround:

Unknown

Platforms:

Select the officially supported platforms where the issue was reproduced:

• Android: App
• Android: mWeb Chrome
• iOS: App
• iOS: mWeb Safari
• iOS: mWeb Chrome
• Windows: Chrome
• MacOS: Chrome / Safari
• MacOS: Desktop

Platforms Tested:

On which of our officially supported platforms was this issue tested:

• Android: App
• Android: mWeb Chrome
• iOS: App
• iOS: mWeb Safari
• iOS: mWeb Chrome
• Windows: Chrome
• MacOS: Chrome / Safari
• MacOS: Desktop

Screenshots/Videos

Add any screenshot/video evidence

Bug7004294_1763153606338.6.mp4

View all open jobs on GitHub

Upwork Automation - Do Not Edit

• Upwork Job URL: https://www.upwork.com/jobs/~021993765607050190058
• Upwork Job ID: 1993765607050190058
• Last Price Increase: 2025-12-24

Issue Owner

Current Issue Owner: @Krishna2323

[melvin-bot]

Triggered auto assignment to @zanyrenney (Bug), see https://stackoverflow.com/c/expensify/questions/14418 for more details. Please add this bug to a GH project, as outlined in the SO.

[mukhrr]

Proposal

Please re-state the problem that we are trying to solve in this issue.

Unable to merge workspace distance expense with IOU distance expense

What is the root cause of that problem?

Here we decide not to merge explicitly IOU transactions

App/src/libs/actions/MergeTransaction.ts

Lines 68 to 73 in 7ab470f

	// Temporary exclude IOU reports from eligible list
	// See: https://github.com/Expensify/App/issues/70329#issuecomment-3277062003
	if (isIOUReport(transaction1.reportID) || isIOUReport(transaction2.reportID)) {
	return false;
	}

Here is reference for more info why we did it #70329 (comment)

What changes do you think we should make in order to solve the problem?

We can exlude distance IOU expenses in this case

    const areBothDistanceRequests = isDistanceRequest(transaction1) && isDistanceRequest(transaction2);
    
    // Temporary exclude IOU reports from eligible list, except for distance requests
    // Distance requests can be merged across IOU and workspace contexts
    // See: https://github.com/Expensify/App/issues/70329#issuecomment-3277062003
    if (!areBothDistanceRequests && (isIOUReport(transaction1.reportID) || isIOUReport(transaction2.reportID))) {
        return false;
    }

What alternative solutions did you explore? (Optional)

[dominictb]

@hoangzinh I think we should not show the IOU distance expense as an eligible expense.

[hoangzinh]

Yes, agreed @dominictb. Btw, is it BE issue?

[melvin-bot]

Job added to Upwork: https://www.upwork.com/jobs/~021993765607050190058

[melvin-bot]

Triggered auto assignment to Contributor-plus team member for initial proposal review - @Krishna2323 (External)