Our autoblocking cards feature that will save you time

Managing employee expenses can be a never-ending task for finance teams. The process can be time-consuming and frustrating between chasing down receipts and tracking down missing information. That’s where we come in. At Payhawk, our new feature, ‘auto-blocking employee expense cards,’ means our customers can now block cards if the expenses stay unsubmitted for a certain amount of time.

We do the receipt chasing for you

Imagine you’re a Payhawk customer. With the auto-blocking cards feature, you can block an employee’s corporate card if they don’t hand in their expenses within a given timeframe. This feature helps incentivise employees to submit their expenses on time and reduces the time spent chasing receipts and expense details, resulting in a faster, more efficient month-end close.

We already motivate employees to submit receipts and expenses as the payment happens through our easy-to-use app with real-time prompts and reminders. However, there are always less diligent colleagues when it comes to timely submission, and this new feature gives them a much-needed extra nudge in the direction.

How does Payhawk’s auto-blocking card feature work?

Our new auto-blocking cards feature makes finance professionals’ lives easier — and it’s easy to use. These are the simple steps involved:

1. The Admin can edit an existing policy and select ‘auto-blocking cards’ in the advanced settings
2. The Admin can determine how many days should pass before the expenses are marked as late, and for how many late expenses you should block the card
3. Once the card reaches the maximum number of late expenses, then it will be blocked, and the employee notified
4. The Admin can add auto-blocking to spend policies by individual or team
5. Employees will receive late expense notifications through the mobile app and email. These reminders will happen one day before they reach the blocking threshold. Employees will also receive warnings through the portal. And all of these will be visible whenever the employee has two or more late expenses.
6. Employees can unblock their cards by submitting the late expenses and falling below the threshold for max late expenses.

Empower your finance team to focus on strategy

Auto-blocking employee cards can save finance teams a lot of time and hassle by tackling the challenge of late expense submissions. Instead, they can use this valuable time to work on strategic tasks to support the organisation’s business objectives. In a recent report published in collaboration with the Harvard Business Review Analytic Services, 64% of business leaders said that finance professionals should work more on analysing financial data. However, 67% of these same business leaders felt that finance professionals spent most of their time chasing receipts/expenses.

Here are some of the biggest benefits of the auto-blocking card feature:

• It incentivises employees to submit their expenses on time by enabling an auto-block of their cards if they don’t submit it in a set timeframe
• It will help you spend less time chasing receipts and expense details and accelerate your month-end close
• Admins can set auto-blocking card rules at a spend policy level, choosing when to mark an expense as late and how many late expense cards should be blocked
• You can capture receipts more easily and process your expenses faster
• You can save time chasing the correct information. Stay audit-ready without missing any critical details.
• You can encourage and remind employees to submit their expenses by sending out **warnings and notifications **

Solve time-consuming expense challenges with Payhawk corporate cards

Implementing the auto-blocking cards feature is simple and effortless, meaning your finance team can divert their focus to more important tasks for the business and forget about chasing receipts.

“I love that we can block cards if people don’t submit receipts on time; it really helps me encourage compliance and good finance hygiene around the business,” Uchenna, Finance Manager at MDM Props, explained. “And we do love a clean process.”

With the new auto-blocking cards feature, you can forecast better as expenses are processed faster and focus on helping your business grow, while we help to keep finance processes running smoothly.

Discover how your finance team can benefit from our new feature. Book a demo with one of our experts.