Emburse Certify vs. Visa Spend Clarity

[Emburse] Certify seems to have been designed with large organizations in mind, particularly those with corporate card programs as opposed to "small business" cards. The integration with American Express Business accounts failed after less than a year, and was not reestablished before we pulled the plug on the whole project. Even worse, [Emburse] Certify's support team wasn't able to offer alternatives.

Incentivized

To find the expenses which need receipts linked, one has to unnecessarily navigate and use two-levels of drop-down menus to filter, when this should be the first thing a user sees when logging in. Logging in requires 2-step-authorization nearly every time. When going to link receipts and update GL codes, one has to click on three different links just to get to view a transaction and available receipts, then wade through receipts that any basic OCR program should have already recognized and linked automatically. For less-obvious PDF receipts there is no quick viewer, every pdf must be redownloaded to view. When a receipt is linked and a GL code is updated the UI doesn't accept it automatically and move on, no...you have to click another link to complete the transaction, though if you click the 'Complete' link and try to move on it gives you an error message and asks if you'd like to delete the transaction, instead you have to go back and hit 'Update' after you've already made the changes, then it allows you to go to the next expense in the list. Absolutely ridiculous and this doesn't even touch on how bad the mobile app is.

• Customer service/support: They have an incredible team. We are fans of the chat option and 99.9% of the time our issues are solved within a 5-minute window.
• Listening to customers: they are always looking for ways to improve their product. They have free conferences sprinkled around various cities. They are worth trending. They provide "what's new in Certify" as well as round-table discussions specifically addressing how their customers are using the product and what they have learned along the way.
• Keeping their product up to date: Certify takes back various suggestions from the conference to enhance their product. I have been at every conference they have had and have actually seen customer suggestions get implemented into the program.

Incentivized

• Quick transactions
• Brand name recognition
• Reliability

Incentivized

• The ability to add a receipt after a report has been submitted would be helpful. This would simplify processing as opposed to disapproving the report and sending it back to the user for correction and re-submission.
• Though not a fault of Certify, our users drive multiple destinations every day, rather than occasional trips from city A to city B. Therefore, capturing mileage is a time-consuming process for our users.

Incentivized

• Focused on virtual visa limits, some locations may need real card connected.
• Limit per card and period - once reached and notified would be great to have extra 10% from the funding account added. Cause there may be FX differences or the person is in travel in a different time zone for calling to manually add balance by admin.
• Admin account must assign names of categories only (unified for all users).
• Invoicing tool - if user spend not properly to send a payback request.
• Core services integration: Booking, Uber, Trip Advisor, AirBNB, Flow, GoodRX.
• Loan request from a user to funding account: he may need to cover some uncovered by agreement costs - set request, set a return date.
• Business reports at Admin or Funding account level to see helicopter picture as it is for a period even prior kept records to books or exported to CSV to process.

Incentivized

I am very used to Certify's components. But some users that I manage still have a hard time fixing their expense reports no matter how many times I try to teach them. The Editing expense Report and Adding Expense Report option sometimes gets confusing and causes some employees to enter transactions twice. There should be a better layout to make it easier for them to edit and finish their expense reports. I try to teach Certify as much as I can, but the usability should be a bit easier so it is less confusing.

Incentivized

The measure of support is how well they respond when you really need them, like when the system is not performing correctly. We have been on the platform less than a year, and there have been at least 2 instances, where the platform was down. The 2nd time was the day before out fiscal year end. And they need a development website. When they are making changes to your LIVE instance, and things go wrong, the client is the first to know about it! I've come to understand that Certify has tiers of support. Those in tier 1, barely know more about the software than the users. I sent a request for a report that shows expense reports currently pending approval and after 5 days of back and forth I was told to build it myself.

Incentivized

We used Concur prior to Certify. It cost 5x as much and was not worth the money. We also looked at Expensify, which had minor issues compared to what we are dealing with in Certify. Certify does not compare to Concur. The platforms are in two different leagues. Expensify is a good comparison and it is compatible with major ERPs like Sage Intacct. Nexonia, is actually also an Emburse product and likely would have been a better fit given it's integration capabilities with Sage Intacct.

Incentivized

It is mostly focused on virtual visa operations. In general, all cash flow controlling suits easily can start from Excel or Google Colab integrations and evolve even to Sungard or WSS. It depends. Visa Spend Clarity is about your flexibility "to have your own bank in a pocket" - open sub-accounts, set limits, and reconcile costs actually made by your contractors or employees. We should see it wider and include Uber, Booking, Airbnb, and Flow interactions to make it a really fast process for your contractor from your "Yes" to contractor "Done". The Visa Spend Clarity is not exactly about your money (costs). It is more about your ability to start acting faster even if all details of cooperation with a person are not agreed upon, but as soon as possible, discuss critical details or add maneuver to your decision-making while limiting financial risk with reasonable limits.

Incentivized

• We have reduced the amount of time our operations department has to spend booking flights to 0.
• Hotel bookings have been greatly streamlined and we are looking to eliminate human interaction with this process once CC authorisations are handled.
• We have eliminated the wait time between operational travel research and client approval time -- it can all be handled in one single step now.

Incentivized

• Some possible positive impacts of Visa Spend Clarity include increased transparency of spending habits, more effective budgeting and money management, and improved overall financial health. Additionally, Visa Spend Clarity may also lead to more strategic and informed decision-making when it comes to using credit.
• On the other hand, some possible negative impacts of Visa Spend Clarity include feelings of anxiety or guilt associated with credit card spending, as well as the potential for overspending if users are not careful.
• Additionally, Visa Spend Clarity may also lead to financial arguments or conflict if users are not on the same page about their spending habits.