If you’re a business owner looking for an easy business spending solution, FLOAT may be the card for you.
This is a corporate card that requires no personal guarantees, is available in Canadian and US funds, has high limits and takes less than 10 minutes to apply. We decided to try it out ourselves and here is what we think so far.
About Float:
Float Card allows you to spend, track, approve and reconcile your business transactions all on an easy-to-use platform.
You have two options for how you allow your employees to spend. You can give them a physical card, or issue a virtual card. Both options give you customizable spending controls and real-time reporting to help you manage business spending.
The number of cards you can issue is unlimited, so you can have one for each employee, or have cards dedicated to spending at specific vendors. Float allows you to set limits, and pause or cancel these cards whenever needed.
Once they’ve made a purchase, Float can text users a message reminding them to upload the receipt. They can snap a photo and text it directly to Float. No more lost or forgotten receipts. The Float software automatically matches the submitted receipts to transactions on the card.
Later, the account admin simply logs on and reviews and approves the transactions. Float can be integrated with Xero, Quickbooks or NetSuite so that transactions can be automatically exported into your accounting platform.
The best part about Float? They’re a Canadian company, founded by a couple of graduates of Waterloo’s computer science and business programs.
Our experience so far:
Signing up for the Float card was realitivly simple. We'll go more in depth into that process in a future blog post. Basically the administrator needed to prove their identiy, and set up some spending rules.
Once a card was created for office spending, I had to fill in a form, provide proof of identity (which involved showing a driver's licence and facial recognition) and set up a pin.
The whole process took about 10 minutes. The card showed up in the mail exactly 10 days later. It was easy to activate – just log onto the website provided when the card shows up and click ACTIVATE PHYSICAL CARD.
When it came time to make a purchase, it worked just like any other Visa or Mastercard. With a simple tap at the checkout, I was able to purchase the office supplies needed.
Shortly after the purchase was made I got a friendly text message from FLOAT reminding me to upload the receipt and categorize the expense. The text included a link, or the option to just reply with a picture of the receipt to attach it to the transaction. Super simple.
For this purchase, I chose to go to the website and upload the receipt. The Float dashboard is really easy to understand and use. I selected the transaction and uploaded the image of the receipt. Using the notes field I could say exactly what was purchased.
Additional details you can add include the general ledger code, vendor and tags the administrator can set up. All of this information makes posting the transition to your accounting platform a breeze.
Final thoughts
The Float card is an easy-to-use solution for business and employee spending. We like that now our employees no longer need to go through the process of spending their own money, submitting the expense and waiting for reimbursement. There's no annual fee, so even if it just sits in your office drawer most of the time, it's worth it! And it can easily be paused or cancelled if a card is lost or stolen.
The best part is the ease of use for staff. If your employees have a smartphone it is incredibly easy for them to submit their receipts right away. No more chasing them for lost or crumpled receipts. If you're interetested in how Reach can help you simplify your employee expense tracking, reach out!