[$250] Expense - Please enter a valid merchant error is shown when entering merchant as Expense

[jponikarchuk]

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Version Number: v9.3.17-0
Reproducible in staging?: Yes
Reproducible in production?: Yes
If this was caught during regression testing, add the test name, ID and link from BrowserStack: https://test-management.browserstack.com/projects/2219752/folder/13177029/test-cases/41237804
Email or phone of affected tester (no customers): dreamnitethedragon+yydyd373@gmail.com
Issue reported by: Applause Internal Team
Bug source: Exploratory - Significant User Experience Deterioration
Device used: Redminote 10S Android 13
App Component: Money Requests

Action Performed:

1. Launch app
2. Open workspace chat
3. Tap plus icon - create expense
4. Enter amount and tap next
5. Enter merchant as "Expense"
6. Tap save
7. Note please enter a valid merchant error is shown
8. Enter merchant as "expense" or "EXPENSE"
9. Tap save
10. Note no error is shown

Expected Result:

Please enter a valid merchant error must not be shown when entering merchant as Expense.

Actual Result:

Please enter a valid merchant error is shown when entering merchant as Expense.

Workaround:

Unknown

Platforms:

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

Screenshots/Videos

1.mp4

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Issue Owner

Current Issue Owner: @Pujan92

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• Last Price Increase: 2026-03-17

[daledah]

Proposal

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

Actual Result:
Please enter a valid merchant error is shown when entering merchant as "Expense".

What is the root cause of that problem?

The root cause is in the isInvalidMerchantValue function in src/libs/ValidationUtils.ts:

App/src/libs/ValidationUtils.ts

Lines 771 to 773 in 04c98c9

	function isInvalidMerchantValue(merchant?: string): boolean {
	return merchant === '' || merchant === CONST.TRANSACTION.PARTIAL_TRANSACTION_MERCHANT || merchant === CONST.TRANSACTION.DEFAULT_MERCHANT;
	}

The function uses a case-sensitive comparison (merchant === CONST.TRANSACTION.DEFAULT_MERCHANT) where DEFAULT_MERCHANT is 'Expense'. This means:

• "Expense" (exact match) → invalid
• "expense" or "EXPENSE" → valid

The validation should use case-insensitive comparison to treat all variations of "Expense" consistently.

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

Update the isInvalidMerchantValue function to use case-insensitive comparison:

function isInvalidMerchantValue(merchant?: string): boolean {
-    return merchant === '' || merchant === CONST.TRANSACTION.PARTIAL_TRANSACTION_MERCHANT || merchant === CONST.TRANSACTION.DEFAULT_MERCHANT;
+    const lowerMerchant = merchant?.toLowerCase();
+    return merchant === '' || merchant === CONST.TRANSACTION.PARTIAL_TRANSACTION_MERCHANT || lowerMerchant === CONST.TRANSACTION.DEFAULT_MERCHANT.toLowerCase();
}

What alternative solutions did you explore? (Optional)

N/A

[melvin-bot]

8 days overdue is a lot. Should this be a Weekly issue? If so, feel free to change it!

[melvin-bot]

Triggered auto assignment to @kadiealexander (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.