Attivo Partners automates 80% of expense categorization with Brex and Puzzle

Volume and friction, with expensive manual work

Attivo Partners was growing rapidly, but the growth created a troubling pattern: they were scaling linearly. More client transactions meant more headcount, with senior accountants spending most of their time on lower-value work.

"It wasn't complexity. It was volume and friction," says John Truong, Assistant Controller, Attivo Partners. "Manually reviewing transactions in the month-end close, coding inconsistencies, chasing down receipts."

Attivo was using a fragmented financial stack: QuickBooks for the ledger, and separate systems for reimbursements, bill pay, and corporate cards. Each tool worked in isolation. "It wasn't really connected with anything," John recalls. "A lot of manual import-exports. Waiting for CSVs."

Senior accountants were reviewing nearly 100% of client transactions manually. Month-end close meant chasing down missing receipts, reconciling across disconnected systems, and validating repetitive, low-risk activity.

"We had highly skilled team members spending most of their time validating repetitive low-risk activity," John says. "It's not leverage at all."

One intelligent platform for spend, cards, and bill pay

Attivo chose Brex as the intelligent operating system for their finances. This allowed them to consolidate cards, reimbursements, banking, and bill pay into a single AI-native platform. Integrated with Puzzle's accounting software, this solution transformed how Attivo's team worked. "It was a breath of fresh air," John says. "Things that we thought we had to do manually were just automated."

Brex captures spend data with full context at the point of transaction. Receipts, memos, categories, and GL codes all flow directly into the Puzzle accounting system via seamless integration. This enables continuous ledger preparation because spend data flows into the ledger in real time with context intact, eliminating the manual CSV exports and imports.

With Brex, card issuance, approval workflows, and policy enforcement all happen in one place with built-in controls, giving Attivo's team visibility and control without the operational drag. "At the end of the month it's not chasing people down for things, it's just reviewing and making sure things reconcile," John explains. "Yep, check."

“Brex and Puzzle was a breath of fresh air. Things that we thought we had to do manually were just automated."

— John Truong, Assistant Controller, Attivo Partners

From counting transactions to consulting on strategy

With Brex and Puzzle, Attivo Partners fundamentally changed how they operate. Across their 400+ VC-backed startup clients, the firm now handles 80% of transactions through automated categorization, with accuracy reaching 86.9%. Senior accountants shifted from reviewing nearly every transaction to exception-based oversight only.

The time savings were significant, but where that time went matters more. Senior accountant capacity increased without adding headcount. Each can now manage more clients while delivering higher-value work. Hours that used to get burned validating mundane transactions now go into what clients actually pay for: implementing systems for data-driven decision making, designing internal controls, setting and enforcing policy, and providing proactive insight instead of reactive cleanup.

"It's really allowing us to shift from being a transaction processing mentality to being strategic oversight, working more on providing insights," John says. "It's allowing us to replace that time we would have spent just dealing with transaction categorization, to actually advising our clients, interpreting the financials."

"The solution is really allowing us to shift from a transaction processing mentality to strategic oversight, working more on providing insights.”

— John Truong, Assistant Controller, Attivo Partners

For firms supporting high-growth startups, Brex's unified platform paired with Puzzle accounting software solves a fundamental scaling problem: how to handle increasing transaction volume without proportionally increasing headcount. "Technology is amazing," John says, "but you still need the human element to design guardrails and controls, and handle the exceptions."

With Brex and Puzzle working together, Attivo's team can stay focused on governance, judgment, and strategic guidance, while the integrated platform connects spend management and accounting, reduces manual work, and delivers real-time financial visibility. Get started with Brex and Puzzle in one click today.