American Express Global Business Travel (GBT) has launched its new spend management platform, ‘Neo1’, in the UK.
Designed for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), the free online service helps finance teams manage cashflow.
SMEs can set up the platform “in less than five minutes”
GBT is a multinational travel and meetings programme management company, headquartered in New Jersey. It is a joint venture that is not wholly owned by American Express. It’s owned by a holdings company based in Amsterdam.
Neo1
The new spend management platform integrates purchasing from Amazon Business and GBT’s online travel booking tool.
Finance managers can gain visuals on employee spending and categorise spending. Headers include ‘office supplies’, ‘utilities’ and ‘travel bookings’, among others.
The dashboard displays money spent, money committed, and future spend requests.
GBT says “it is particularly helpful in managing large volumes of smaller line items, which can collectively amount to a significant percentage of overall business expense”.
“People can request budgets, order supplies and manage all purchasing, payment and expense reporting in one place online,” says Neo1’s general manager, Fiona Hastings.
“Payments are integrated from corporate cards, while the same system is used to log claims for reimbursements.”
SMEs can set up the platform “in less than five minutes”, adds Hasting.
Cashflow in COVID-19
Neo1’s roll-out date fast-forwarded due to the urgency of cashflow visibility for SMEs during the coronavirus.
According to a MarketFinance report in March, 69% of the UK’s SMEs reported “significant pressures” on their cash levels due to the pandemic.
“We actually expedited development of Neo1 to make it available to business owners as soon as we could,” says GBT’s Northern European general manager and vice president, Jason Geall.
“We understand how important cash flow and liquidity are to companies in the current environment. It’s crucial they have the tools to manage their businesses as efficiently as possible.
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