Getting started with Brex

Your account credit limit is the amount of funds you and your team have available to make purchases from all your Brex cards and spend limits. Your limit is determined by several factors, including your Brex product type and your company’s current available funds. You can read more about account limits in this help article.

Your team members will use their Brex cards to make all of their business-related purchases. We offer every user with an applicable role type one physical card and one virtual spend limit card per spend limit they’re assigned to. Transacting with these cards generates an expense entry item in your Brex account, allowing you to manage every business dollar spent.

When inviting a new user, make sure to create a spend limit so that they can start spending. You can always set up more than one spend limit. PremiumEnterprise Create budgets to track, group, and organize spend across your organization.

A Brex business account is a money management account that you can use to hold or transfer funds. This means accepting payments from or sending payments to your vendors directly from your Brex account. Anyone using a Brex card with daily payments will automatically receive a Brex business account, while those using Brex cards with monthly payments can choose whether or not they would like one. You can read more about Brex business accounts in this help article.

When signing into your Brex dashboard for the first time, you’ll be prompted to fill out some company details, as well as complete some tasks to better manage your business operations.

Step 1: Verify your business

Provide basic details about your company such as business address, incorporation details, and ownership information. This helps us to understand and serve your company better. The specific information that we’ll need depends on whether you’ve already raised funds from professional investors, whether you haven’t yet but plan to, or whether you do not plan to at all. Essentials You’ll also be asked to provide company ownership information, which must be completed before moving to the next step. PremiumEnterpriseP-card You can move to the next step and apply for financial services after you complete your initial business verification. If you’re not ready to apply for financial services yet, you can skip to Step 2b and provide your company’s ownership information first. To select your preferred financial product (the Brex business account and/or the Brex card), follow the prompts that appear on your screen.

Step 2a: Apply for financial services

We use connected bank accounts to help determine your company's credit limit. Your credit limit is the total amount your entire team — across all of your cards and spend limits — can spend during a given statement period. Essentials You can connect your bank account using Plaid to give us a real-time look into your financials, or indicate that you want to upload bank statements, instead. If you don’t have the right financial data available, you can tell us more about your financial situation to help make sure we get you the appropriate spending limit. After adding your initial bank connection, you can connect additional bank accounts from the Settings section of your dashboard. You can also view, remove, or fix current connections from this same place. Note: If you want to skip to setting up your Brex business account, you can do so here.

Step 2b: Provide your business/company owner details

PremiumEnterpriseP-card If you have yet to verify company ownership, we’ll ask for details on your business owner/account owner. This includes the Social Security number or valid ID of the owner applying for your new Brex account, among other details.

Step 3: Set up budgets and spend limits

PremiumEnterprise Create budgets to track, group, and organize spend across your organization. Regardless of your plan, when inviting a new user, make sure to create a spend limit so that they can start spending. You can always set up more than one spend limit.

Step 4: Invite users and manage organization

Before you start inviting new users to join your Brex account, go to the Team tab to create departments and locations (if applicable). This helps you organize your workforce depending on their area of the business and their physical location. At this point, you’ll have everything in place to start inviting users. Make sure that you know what different role types we offer, so you can assign them appropriately.

Step 5: Manage users

After your invited team members finish setting up their own user accounts, you’ll manage how they operate within your Brex account. While many of their permissions will be tied to the role type you originally gave them, you can delegate new duties to them as applicable. This includes setting up account copilots or assigning managers to approve employee spend.

Step 6: Integrate your accounting software

Brex integrates directly with several different accounting softwares to enable automatic reconciliation that may save your finance team many hours per month. Please refer to the relevant integration setup and management instructions:

• QuickBooks Online
• Expensify
• Xero
• NetSuite
• Sage Intacct
• Concur
• Pilot

Step 7: Start using Brex Rewards

Brex Rewards is the most valuable card rewards program on the market — and there’s no cap on what you earn. If your company uses Brex as its primary corporate card, you'll qualify for Brex Exclusive and earn points on every US dollar spent with a US merchant. For added points accumulation, we offer different multipliers depending on your industry. You can view your current points balance from the Marketplace in your Brex dashboard. When you’re ready to redeem those points, you can do so for statement credit, travel benefits, airline miles, cryptocurrency, plus more. All of your options are highlighted in this help article.

Step 8: Learn about Brex travel

Brex travel allows you to book trips from your Brex app or dashboard — including flights, accommodations, and rental cars. You’ll want to start by establishing your Brex travel account, after which you and your team can start booking.

Step 9: Activate your Brex account

Once your account is set up, you can start using it by transacting on your Brex card or initiating a transfer to/from your Brex business account. Important: Please make sure to do this within the first 90 days of when your account opens, so your account doesn’t become inactive.

To start using your Brex business account, take the following steps.

Step 1: Fund your Brex business account

You have several different options to transfer funds into your Brex business account, including check, ACH, and wire. You can transfer funds from an external bank account — either by connecting that bank account via your Brex dashboard or by initiating a transfer from your bank’s platform. Note: You’ll also want to take processing times into consideration when you’re funding your account.

Step 2: Invite Brex business account-specific users

Account admins and AP clerks are two role types that are only available if you have a Brex business account. Account admins have a full view of both card and Brex business account transactions. They can set up integrations and invite new AP clerks, and are the only role type that can initiate payments with Brex business accounts. Bookkeepers act similarly to a read-only user. While they can’t initiate payments, they can see all transactions on the account and manage any integrations.

Step 3: Make your first payment

Once you’ve successfully transferred funds into your account, you can find your current available balance by reading this help article. As long as you have a positive balance, you can initiate outbound payments via ACH, domestic​​/international wire, or check.

Step 4: Connect your payroll and other resources

You can connect your company resources with Brex using your account and routing numbers. For instructions on connecting popular payroll services, please read this help article.

Once your account or card admin has set up your Brex account, you can expect to receive an invitation to create your user profile. Here are the steps to follow after that invitation email arrives in your inbox.

Step 1: Accept your invitation

If your team's account, card, or user management admin has created a new user account for you, you'll receive an email with the subject line: “[Action required] Welcome to Brex! Your corporate card is waiting.” When you open the email, click the Create account button to accept your invitation. After accepting, you'll be redirected to the Brex dashboard to enter your phone number.

Step 2: Request your physical card

You’ll have the option to order a physical Brex card — or can issue one at a later date by reading this help article. You can reference the same article to issue yourself virtual cards. Your physical card should arrive in 7-10 business days, at which point you can activate it.

Step 3: Add your card to a spend limit

To start spending with your physical card, choose the spend limit you’d like to spend from. In most cases, your virtual cards will be assigned to a single spend limit, though in some cases you can update their spend limits too. Any spend limits assigned to you will represent how much you can spend for different purposes. If you have more than one spend limit, you can instantly change which spend limit is assigned to your card via your dashboard or app, and spend up to that particular spend limit limit. If you need another spend limit at any point in the future, please read this help article.

Step 4: Manage your expenses

Once you start using your Brex card, your expenses will reflect in your history in both the Brex app and dashboard. Your account or card admin may require you to attach receipts and/or memos to your expenses — or, even if they don’t, you might prefer to do this yourself for organization purposes.

Step 5: Manage your direct reports’ expenses

If you’re a manager, account admin, or card admin that’s been designated as the approver for other team members’ transactions, you can monitor any inbound requests from the Tasks page of your dashboard. This includes reviewing expenses, bill payment drafts, and higher spend limit limit requests.

Step 6: Learn about repayments and reimbursements

US and global reimbursements are business expenses that you make on a personal card that you can request be paid back. Repayments are personal expenses you may unintentionally make on your Brex card that you pay your company back for. To use either product, first connect a personal bank account by following the steps in this help article. Afterward, you can start submitting reimbursement requests or repaying expenses as needed.