Re: Pennywise and pound foolish
What it's usually about, really, is that the little people in HR and Finance believe it is ever so great and glorious to be travelling all over the place at the company's expense, so they get very envious and set out to exact whatever little revenge there is to be had within the scope of their feeble powers.
To break their spell, one has to deliberately exceed the limits on hotels, flights or whatever, then have ones manager sign for the expenses and then ram it down their throats. After that one can scale back one star on the hotel or whatever and they will leave it well alone (until new people arrive and one has to make an impression yet again).