Look a week long trip to Abu Dhabi means that yes I am going to run up a laundry bill. And its not like it was from the first day, it was given on the 4th or 5th day.
I once had a job with a sales agency, they had stupid rules regarding expenses, too.
Their standard compensation “deal” was a 60/40 commision split with the salesman getting 60%. So before I started I negotiated a non-standard deal, I would pay ALL my own expenses, car, travel, meals…and in return I would get 75% of commissions with the agency getting 25%.
So I made more money total and got to be completely efficient and avoid stupid expense rules.
I feel you mate, I feel you. Bloody accounting has gotten massively tedious in the past couple years. Wanting me to get fucking receipts on taxis in goddamned Abuja and the like. As if the taxi driver is even marginally literate…
More money for the company, or more money for yourself? What was the average size of the deals? I can imagine the kind of accounts department causing grief to many of the posters to this thread balking at that kind of lateral thinking, even if your non-accounts bosses agree with the deal…
ETA: Oh and here’s another one - we have to provide a petrol (gasoline) receipt for all travel claims. I tend to provide any old receipt lying around, but it feels like the assumption is that your car is permanently empty, you predict how much petrol you’re going to use, put exactly that amount of petrol in the car, and just make it home from your trip on empty again…
Do it the other way? Fill the car up before your business trip then when the trip is finished fill it up again and expense the last one.
Like FCM, I’m a government employee, and get a per diem while traveling. I was in a similar setup once when traveling to one place for a week, and did a modified version of what you did - had breakfast in my room so I didn’t have to get moving quickly in the mornings, and while I ate out most evenings and some lunches, I had enough non-breakfasty stuff in the room for lunches when it was convenient to be back at the room, the occasional dinner hour where I just didn’t feel like going out, and to satisfy my penchant for late-night snacks.
The difference being that when I came out a good bit ahead, I got to keep the money. 
You can blame the accounting staff if you like (true enough, we are a bunch of anal retentives), but the blame should more accurately be placed on companies like Enron and Arthur Andersen who created the need for accountability down to the last penny (see also: Sarbanes-Oxley). And, yeah, there are a lot of companies and decision-makers in those companies who take the idea of accountability and turn it into something to plague their staff with.
I used to work for a company where beer and wine were allowable expenses, but liquor was not. So:
- Drinking 17 beers and coming to the seminar hungover: Expense.
- Having 1 cocktail before dinner: Not allowed.