By default, the Financial Controller AI Agent sends consolidated reminders during working days to employees for submitting and approving expenses. Instead of notifying you about each expense individually, the Agent groups all pending items into a single bulk reminder at the scheduled time, giving you a clear overview of everything that needs your attention. A reminder that would fall on a non-working day (weekend or public holiday in the country of incorporation of the business entity) moves to the next available slot.
Each reminder also includes a short AI-generated summary of every pending item (what the expense is and what is still missing), so employees can act without opening each one.
Default cadence
The Financial Controller AI Agent follows a defined chasing schedule that determines how often employees receive bulk reminders. By default, the AI Agent adjusts reminder frequency based on the urgency of the pending expenses:
During the month, reminders are sent at regular intervals, with the AI Agent grouping all pending items into each notification.
When approaching month-end, the reminder frequency increases to ensure all expenses are submitted and approved on time.
After month-end, follow-up reminders continue for a few days for any remaining unresolved items.
The AI Agent also adapts its tone and persistence throughout the month, becoming more direct as deadlines approach.
Reminder type | What’s included | Reminder schedule (local time) | Notes |
Offline card payments to submit | All card expenses with missing documents or pending submission. Examples:
| 10:00 AM:
| Cards used at the point of sale (POS). Each reminder lists all expenses currently awaiting your action, so you can review and submit them in one go. |
Online card payments to submit | All card expenses with missing documents or pending submission. Examples:
| 10:00 AM:
| More lenient due to receipts sitting in inboxes or vendor apps. Each reminder lists all expenses currently awaiting your action, so you can review and submit them in one go. |
Expenses to approve | All submitted expenses awaiting your approval. | 4:00 PM:
| Each reminder lists all pending approval requests, allowing you to review and approve them in bulk. |
End-of-month | All pending submissions and approvals. | 11:00 AM:
| Ensures timely month-end reporting. |
Custom cadence
You can also set up your own reminder schedule either through conversing with the AI Agent in the communication channel or in the Payhawk Web Portal as described below:
In the Payhawk Web Portal, go to Settings > AI Office > Financial Controller Agent > Configure.
Turn off the Default cadence option.
Click on the Customize link. This will redirect you to a conversation with the Financial Controller AI Agent in the Payhawk Web Portal.
Tell the AI Agent how often you want the it to send reminders to your employees.
To revert to the default reminder frequency, directly ask the AI Agent.
When an employee has activated online receipt and invoice fetching and authenticated with the vendor's portal, the Financial Controller AI Agent first attempts to retrieve the receipt automatically before sending a reminder to upload it manually. For more information, see the article about using the Financial Controller AI Agent for online receipt and invoice fetching.