Brex Review: Charge Card and Cash Management Account for Businesses
Ranking
9.1/10
A rewards card for your business and a cash management account all in one. Read our full review for all the perks Brex offers.
Highlights:
- No fees
- Earns rewards
- Doesn't affect your personal credit
Handling your business’s expenses can be tricky, and even more so if you’re a startup without much history or equity. That makes finding the right card for your business even more important… something that Brex understands all too well.
Brex is a corporate charge card that is not only great for traditional businesses, but also caters to startups. It offers business owners an easy solution for their monthly expenses without charging fees or interest.
Let’s take a look at Brex and why it might be the right card for your company.
What Is Brex?
Brex was founded in June 2018 by two Stanford-grad startup founders. While struggling to manage their own business expenses using personal credit cards, the pair recognized an opportunity. Creating the first corporate credit card for startups.
Brex has also expanded into offering cash management, payment, accounting, and other services, calling itself the financial operating system for the next generation of business.
Brex Features
So, what makes Brex unique, especially when compared to all of the other corporate cards on the market today?
Brex caters to businesses looking for the following features in a card.
- Struggling to get approved for a company card with a high enough limit
- Needing a card that doesn’t charge high fees
- Wanting a card that earns rewards
When you are a business owner and open a business credit card account, your own credit history will be taken into consideration. The monthly card activity is often reported to the credit bureaus, so if your company is struggling or simply racks up a high balance one month, it will impact your credit score.
With Brex, the onus falls entirely on your company. Statements are paid directly from your business bank accounts, versus personal ones, and your credit won’t feel the effects of whatever activity your business has on the card.
Beyond its credit cards, Brex also offers Brex Cash, a business cash management account. It helps companies of any size store and send cash as well as track their spending.
Brex Cash has a lot of perks compared to typical cash management accounts. It’s completely free to send ACH or wire transfers, including international transfers. That means you can easily pay vendors anywhere in the world.
The account also links to Brex’s credit cards. You don’t get a debit card with the account. Instead, you swipe your credit card and Brex pulls the money from your Brex Cash account daily. A bonus of this is that each time you swipe your card, you earn rewards.
You can give multiple employees access to your Brex Cash account and limit their access based on their role in the company. You can also create workflows and transaction approval flows to make sure every transaction is approved by the appropriate person in your business. This can help increase transparency and account security for a small business.
If you’re worried about insurance, Brex Cash also includes the option to move any portion of your funds to FDIC insured bank accounts at Brex’s program bank partners, which keeps your cash safe.
Brex 30 Card
The card charges no annual fee and offers quick approvals for business owners and has no personal guarantee requirement. You also don’t have to worry about interest charges because the card is a charge card. You must pay for purchases within 30 days of making them.
To qualify, your business must have $50,000 in its bank accounts if the money is invested. Otherwise, the business must have $100,000 available.
To make running your business easier, Brex has several integrations with tools like Quickbooks, NetSuite, Concur, and Xero, which can help you manage your finances and keep your accounting accurate.
When you use the card, you’ll earn points with several bonus reward categories.
You’ll earn:
- 7x points on rideshares
- 4x points on flights and hotels through Brex Travel
- 3x on dining
- 1x on everything else
Points are redeemable for statement credits at a rate of 1 point for 0.7 cents. You can redeem for gift cards, in the travel portal at a rate of 1 point to 1 cent. You can also transfer points to other loyalty programs.
Brex Cash Account
Brex Cash is a cash management account that can serve as a replacement for your business bank account that Brex advertises as a financial operating system. As your business’s financial OS, the Brex Cash Account aims to make managing your finances easier.
There are no monthly fees and no minimums. Plus, the account comes with a 50,000 point sign up bonus after spending $9,000 in the first 30-days and a Brex card that you can use to make daily purchases. You’ll earn rewards with the card just like with any other Brex card.
Brex’s friendly fee structure extends beyond there being no monthly fees. You also won’t have to worry about paying a fee for wire transfers (even international ones) or other common transactions.
You’ll also get access to a powerful mobile app that lets you schedule recurring transactions to pay your vendors, deposit checks, and keep an eye on your account balance.
Like with the Brex 30 card, you’ll earn rewards if you use the card that comes with your Brex Cash account. You’ll get a one-time bonus of 30,000 points once you link a revenue or payroll account. You’ll also be able to redeem points for statement credits at a rate of 1 point to 1 cent instead of the lower rate available to those without a Cash account.
If you sign up for Brex Daily, which means paying your card balance daily from your Cash account, you’ll earn slightly more rewards.
- 8x points on rideshares
- 5x points on flights and hotels through Brex Travel
- 4x on dining
- 1.5x on advertisements
- 1x on everything else
Pricing
Since Brex is a charge card, versus a credit card, you must pay your statement balance in full each month. This means that there are no finance charges to worry about on your balance. Plus, the payment will be automatically drafted from your corporate bank account when it’s due, so there’s no worry about late fees.
There are no annual fees with Brex. You can use the card and earn rewards with all of your spending, and do so without worrying about a fee each year. Of course, the primary focus of Brex is to help corporations manage their spending without fees–versus focusing on just the rewards–but we will talk more about that below.
A Brex card can be given to every single one of your employees if you desire, with no limit. You can manage each of these cards individually, setting appropriate limits and tracking activity.
Requirements for Signing Up
If you want to open a Brex corporate card account, there are a few things your business needs.
First, you’ll have to show that your business has at least $50,000 on-hand, by linking your corporate bank account. This may sound like a lot if you’re accustomed to only carrying business credit cards, but it’s actually a much lower cash balance than most corporate cards would require you to show. Of course, having $50,000+ doesn’t guarantee that you’ll get approved for the Brex card, but it is the minimum required.
Next, you’ll need to provide some other information that will help with the underwriting process. Before approving your application and assigning you a credit limit, Brex wants to know your company’s spending habits and the investors you have, in addition to your cash balance. They will then set your limit accordingly.
If you want to have an idea of the credit limit you’ll be given before you even apply, you can contact Brex ahead of time. By providing some details about your company, they can give you an estimated limit.
Synchronization
Brex promises an enviable rewards program to its corporate cardholders, calling it the best rewards for startups. The card company also claims that its program is “focused on rewards your business can use and has the highest redemption value of any rewards offering.”
Brex has already partnered with companies like Amazon Web Services, Instacart, DoorDash, Salesforce, and ZenDesk to provide rewards that your business may need. If Brex follows through with its promise of the highest redemption value out there, though, it should be an excellent program.
Brex also integrates seamlessly with a number of accounting platforms, such as QuickBooks, Netsuite, Zero, and Expensify. Their software will help you reconcile accounts automatically, track expenses, and then transfer everything to your own accounting software program. You can even instantly send receipts via message or email from your phone. Brex will then match and upload the receipt to your statement.
Customer Support
You can contact customer support by email at support@brex.com or by phone at 1-833-228-2044. There’s also a chat function available on the website.
Pros and Cons
Pros
- It's free — No monthly fees and no minimums.
- Rewards — Brex promises a superior rewards program.
- Doesn't affect your personal credit — Statements are paid from your business bank accounts, not your personal ones.
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No foreign transaction fees — Depending on the personal or business card you use, transactions made in, or with, a foreign country can cost you quite a bit extra. In fact, they average about 3% of the amount charged, which can add up pretty quickly.
Foreign transaction fees are charged if a purchase is made while traveling, regardless of whether the merchant makes the sale in the local currency or U.S. dollars. They are also charged if you make a purchase that passes through a foreign bank, such as purchases from overseas companies and suppliers. BREX helps you avoid this expense, though, by not charging foreign transaction fees for any of its cardholders.
Cons
- It's a charge card — If your business occasionally needs to carry a balance for a few extra weeks (or longer), you should look instead at a business credit card.
- Auto-draft payments — With BREX, your full statement balance will be auto-drafted every month from your connected bank account, so there is absolutely no wiggle room on paying the total due.
Brex Alternatives
If you know you won’t be in the position to pay a balance off full every month, then you might need a business credit card instead. Here are some of the highlights from our list of best credit cards for small businesses.
Anyone starting a small business will want to check out the Blue Business℠ Plus Credit Card from American Express. This card is great because it features 0% APR on purchases for 15 months.
If you already travel for business or plan to do so, Capital One® Spark® Miles for Business is an excellent choice. You can earn 2 miles per $1 on every purchase.
If you’re on the road more than you are in the air during your travels, the American Express® Business Gold Card is a better fit. With this card, you can earn 3x points at gas stations.
When you’re looking at these cards, or any others, be sure to pay attention to the interest rates and fees, especially if you’ll be carrying a balance every month.
Bottom Line – Is Brex For You?
Again, the Brex corporate charge card does not have an annual fee and your own personal credit will not be impacted by your application. But you will have to pay the balance in full each month. If you try the card for a while and decide it’s not right for your company, you can always cancel without a negative impact.
You know your business and how it needs to run. So, if you’re looking for an affordable corporate card that is ideal for startups and helps you manage your accounting each month, give Brex a look.
The Brex Mastercard® Corporate Credit Card is issued by Emigrant Bank, Member FDIC. Terms and conditions apply. See the Brex Platform Agreement for details.
Brex Treasury LLC is an affiliated, SEC-registered broker-dealer and member of FINRA and SIPC that provides Brex Cash, a program that allows customers to elect to sweep uninvested cash balances into certain money market mutual funds or FDIC-insured bank accounts at program banks. Investing in securities products involves risk, including possible loss of principal. Brex Treasury is not a bank and your Brex Cash account is not a bank account. Please see brex.com/cash for important legal disclosures. Past performance is not necessarily indicative of future results.
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