Interest in sustainable investing is exploding. In 2022, 65% of all investment in European exchange-traded funds (the most popular type of investment among retail investors) went into “ESG-compliant” products.

Businesses are under growing pressure to present themselves as ethical, and environmentally and socially responsible.

ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) has become one of the most commonly bandied-about terms in business circles. And ESG ratings and data have grown into a $1.3 billion (around £1.08 billion) industry.

But is ESG actually an effective way to evaluate organisations’ impact on the planet? Or is the term close to becoming — if not already — a meaningless buzzword?

What is ESG?

Essentially, ESG is a framework to help with sustainable investing. It measures the overall impact of a particular business on our planet. The assessment is carried out by evaluating performance under three key pillars:

Your effect on the environment (Environmental)

These include considerations such as:

• Your carbon footprint
• How much energy you uses to make your products or deliver your services
• How you source raw materials
• Waste management practices.

Your Impact on the communities you operate in (Social)

• How do you engage with consumers, suppliers, and other stakeholders?
• What are your employment practices like?
• And what kind of approach do you take to product safety and protecting the locals’ quality of life?

How your business is managed (Governance)

• Are there checks and balances in place to ensure management behaves ethically and responsibly?
• Do you have a diverse leadership team?
• Is there a culture of inclusion?
• Do you engage in government lobbying or other political activities?

Sustainable investing: not a new thing

Sustainable investing might seem like a new-fangled invention. But letting ethics drive investment decisions isn’t a new concept.

When the Methodist Church and the Quakers began investing on the stock market in the 19th century, they intentionally avoided companies involved in alcohol production, gambling, and other activities they considered morally questionable.

The idea caught on, and the first ethical investment fund — a mutual fund, called the Pax Fund, set up in protest at the Vietnam War — launched in 1971.

ESG takes things further. It provides, in theory, a set of criteria that lets investors assess how ethical and sustainable any business is.

The idea is that businesses with high ESG scores are bringing about positive change. And, so, are more likely to keep thriving. While those with poor scores are harming the planet, putting their long-term future at risk in the process.

The benefits of ESG and sustainable investing

Mainstream thinking around ESG is that it’s critically important. For two reasons.

First, at a time when people are increasingly worried about climate change and actively seeking out sustainable businesses, ESG offers a set of objective criteria to judge businesses.

There are those businesses striving to improve the planet – and those that, despite billing themselves as sustainable, have questionable credentials. Or, as the ICAEW puts it, ESG is “a mechanism to hold institutions accountable for their operations…”

Second, and more to the point, ESG’s proponents argue it offers compelling financial benefits. Studies suggest that investments with high ESG scores deliver above-market returns. This is typically attributed to the fact that ESG-compliant, sustainable investing is better in the long term.

ESG also makes it possible to identify opportunities and risks that wouldn’t turn up in a traditional financial analysis. Such as the benefits of creating clean, renewable energy, or avoiding the harms of child labour.

Most significantly, ESG is sometimes boiled down to a question of supply and demand. More and more, the argument goes, investors want to put their money into sustainable businesses. So, to remain competitive, investment products need to be sustainable. And ESG offers a way to ensure this is the case.

Beyond the hype: what if Emperor ESG has no clothes?

While, at first glance, it’s hard to disagree with the idea behind ESG, its detractors believe the arguments in its favour are fundamentally flawed.

According to Stuart Kirk, HSBC’s former global head of responsible investments, there are two key problems with ESG in its current form.

First, he says, the financial risks from climate change are being blown out of proportion.

“A common argument,” he says, “is that [climate change is] going to hit GDP in year number, whatever, 2100? They reckon it’s going to lop off 2.5%. Their worst case model lops off 5%.

“What they fail to tell everybody is that between now and 2100 the world is going to be between 500% and 1,000% richer. Lop 5% off that in 2100, who cares? You’ll never notice.”

Second, he says, humans have a track record of adaptation which climate risk models fail to take into account.

He explains:

“Imagine you’re in 1920 or 1930  and somebody said, ‘Stuart, what do you think the effect on growth will be of carbon emissions over the next 100 years?’ And I’d get out my model and go okay, well, there’s a lot of gas guzzling cars, there are a lot of ships, there’s a lot of industry that doesn’t look very good. And we would put together a really, really nasty outlook for today from what we knew.

“We would never have understood deindustrialization. Or the rise of the service economy. We would never understand how machinery is getting more efficient. Likewise, we have no idea what the next 50, 100 years are going to bring.”

The ‘perverse’ incentives of ESG

Kirk’s presentation was roundly condemned for “making light” of the climate crisis and ultimately cost him his job. But even some of his biggest detractors acknowledge that, from a purely financial perspective, he’s talking sense.

PGGM’s head of responsible investment Piet Klop, for instance, observed that: “It’s hard to deny that the ecosystem is going down the tubes [but] within the financial system as we currently know it [Kirk is] probably right…”

Similarly, in an article that ostensibly defends ESG, Peter Krull says bluntly that “many of the ESG funds that retail investors expect to be green are far from that.”

Echoing Kirk, Professor Hans Taparia, of the New York University Stern School of Business, believes the biggest issue with ESG is that it does things backwards.

Instead of scoring businesses on how ethical and environmentally and socially responsible they are, it measures how much carbon emissions, dodgy labour practices, and other ESG factors could harm financial performance.

This, he says, produces perverse results.

“McDonald’s, for instance, was given an upgrade of its ESG rating [in 2021] which cited reduced risks to the company’s bottom line as a result of changes that the company made concerning packaging material and waste.

“But greenhouse gas emissions from the operations and supply chain of McDonald’s, which is one of the world’s largest buyers of beef, grew by 16 percent from 2015 to 2020. Those emissions are a direct cause of climate change, but because [they weren’t seen] as posing a financial risk for McDonald’s, they didn’t negatively affect the rating.”

ESG: right idea, wrong approach?

With scientists issuing increasingly stark warnings about catastrophic climate change and the United Nations observing rising inequality across the globe, it’s clear that the way we do business needs to change. For both ourselves and the generations that will come after us.

From this perspective, ESG is perhaps a step in the right direction. In the sense that it embeds the impacts bad business practices have on society and our planet into our collective consciousness.

As McKinsey’s Sara Bernow notes: “ESG puts the spotlight on sustainability not only in those companies where it is obvious from a value-creation perspective but also where it has been less obvious yet the value-creation potential is still there.

“For example, a company’s ability to reduce its energy consumption is a huge value-creation opportunity.”

Is ESG fit for purpose?

But if intentions are to become action and, in turn, create real, lasting change, the way businesses’ ESG rankings are assessed may need to be rethought.

“One of the tragedies of this whole debate,” says Stuart Kirk, “is that we obsess about mitigation and not enough on adaption financing.

“There are 1000s of opportunities out there. We have a trillion dollar car company that nobody predicted five years ago, including myself, and they’re the sort of opportunities we need to invest in.”

Hans Taparia is even more scathing.

“The current system,” he concludes, “works well for Wall Street. It keeps the raters in business because it ensures that their customers, the investment firms, have lots of stocks with which to construct portfolios.

It enables financial institutions to present themselves as contributing to the well-being of society and the planet. And it allows them to charge higher fees to investors, because ESG funds are seen as different from conventional index funds, in part because they tap into investors’ consciences.

“But this system isn’t good for the world. Just regular capitalism at its slickest: ingenious marketing in the service of profits. The best approach would be to measure the costs to society and the environment that are not directly borne by companies.”

Visit our blog for more articles like this one or subscribe to get them direct to your inbox. Find out more about Soldo here.

In his book For Profit, the law professor William Magnuson sketches a surprising history of the corporation. Throughout history, he shows that corporations were purpose-built to solve societal problems or tackle grand projects.

Corporations built Ancient Rome’s roads and aqueducts, helped the arts flourish during the Renaissance and facilitated the blossoming of the 20th-century middle class.

Things are different now. In many ways better – but, in some ways, not so much. Enterprise is more dynamic and more open to everyone. And the ways companies serve consumers are more diverse and specialised.

But perhaps, as Magnuson’s book illustrates, a more cooperative or social bent to commerce has somewhat diminished. Companies used to have a much more acute appreciation of society (both society at large and the society in miniature that exists in the company’s workforce).

Cuts and worker morale

We only need to look around us to get a barometer reading on worker morale. The UK is gearing up for its largest strike wave in three decades. General morale is dipping (particularly in sectors like care).

Household consumption is set to shrink by 2.3% in 2023. Business investment is set to contract by 3%. Even small creature comforts like Netflix are being eschewed. The streaming giant will shed 700,000 UK users over the next two years, analysts predict.

These are tough economic times. Cuts are a fact of life. Spending needs to be reined in, costs cut. And, perhaps most unfortunately, workers may lose their jobs. It’s easy for these cuts and changes to be adversarial. But that needn’t be inevitable.

Of course, you can’t please everyone when reducing business costs. There are no cost-cutting options available that don’t bring some collateral damage. And the impacts last: A Dutch longitudinal study of employee morale post-cuts, found reduced job satisfaction and less loyalty toward the organisation for at least two years after the cost-cutting event.

Reducing business costs (while minimising damage to morale)

There is no easy option when reducing business costs – but some are better than others. Let’s look at some choices available to company leaders.

Reduce executive compensation:

‘We’re all in this together’ is a common sentiment during an economic downturn. And employees often greet it with suspicion. To paraphrase Animal Farm, it seems that some are more ‘in this’ than others.

That’s why reducing executive compensation (and being open about it) is a powerful tool. By how much? Well, that’s an open question. But certainly enough to signal to employees that management is feeling the same pain. Especially in the case of layoffs.

Reduce expenses:

You need to look at expenses. And not just the costs – but also how you’re managing them. If your expense management system is rudimental and doesn’t allow granular analysis of costs, then investing in a new system is step one.

‘Investing’ doesn’t have to mean a high cost. Many expense management solutions are now in the cloud. Implementation is quick and it’s based on a monthly subscription.

The old saying in business that you have to ‘spend money to make money’ is also true with saving. Sometimes you have to spend money to save it. An expense management solution will make minimising T&E much simpler and also more humane.

When cutting costs, be very wary of items that are high-value but low-cost. Sure, getting in cheaper coffee might save a few pennies – but is that really what’s weighing down the company’s finances? Apply a weighting to these sorts of costs. The harm to morale could outweigh any money saved.

And don’t be afraid to open the floor when it comes to cuts. Get what’s known as functional leaders involved. These are people who aren’t necessarily formal management, but widely respected for their work and influence. Their buy-in when cutting costs is invaluable.

Manage out poor performers:

This should be standard operating procedure, even during easier economic times. Accelerate this process during a downturn. Especially when cuts must be made.

Psychologically, employees will view this as different to workforce cuts. A job loss tied to performance is different to an across-the-board downsizing. It can be a powerful shield for employee morale.

Pushing through the downturn

The downturn is temporary. At some point, it will abate and you can loosen your grip on costs and investment. For now, though, a defensive mindset is what’s needed.

No one is enthusiastic about cuts. But damage to morale can be managed. By making cuts more strategic, you can lower your costs and improve resilience without harming worker (or, indeed, your own) morale.

“Money doesn’t disappear, it just changes hands,” as the adage in economics goes. The opportunities are still out there – but your business must be resilient to seize them.

It’s a difficult economic picture. But this is precisely the time your business should be priming itself to strike.

How to improve operational efficiency

The tried and true way to strengthen a business in a downturn is through operational efficiency savings. Simplistically, some people may view these as just ‘cuts’. But ‘cuts’ don’t actually capture the nuances and skill involved in cost saving.

Blind cutting will likely have a counterproductive impact on your company. Efficiency savings should strengthen a business, not diminish it. So let’s look at some examples of operational efficiency savings.

Renegotiate terms with suppliers

While ‘renegotiation’ could imply a bruising or gruelling reestablishment of terms, it can also be a mutually beneficial exercise. Indeed, it may mean temporarily prioritising certain suppliers at your own expense.

In a recent webinar with Soldo and the Generation CFO, M&S Food’s head of finance Sandeep Dasgupta identified cost pressure as a particular worry. This cost pressure is largely driven by supply chain disruption.

So to keep the supply chain moving, M&S has enacted joint business plans with suppliers (especially smaller suppliers). “We may need to support them in the interim while they are struggling – but then we work together to drive a long-term upside for both parties”.

Adapt to consumer habits

The thing about recessions is that we’ve been here before. They happen from time to time, although this particular recession has been hastened by a series of external factors. Namely COVID and the War in Ukraine.

Looking at previous recessions, it’s possible to sketch out a likely trajectory for this one. An International Monetary Fund (IMF) analysis of 122 recessions in 21 developed countries since 1960 found “that the typical recession lasted about a year and resulted in a dip in GDP of roughly 2%”.

The IMF analysis also found that “consumption trends rebound fairly quickly when the recession ends, though at different rates in different sectors”.

You sort of know what to expect. And that a consumer rebound is likely. The short to medium term will require some adaptation to consumer needs, however.

One notable trend is what the Harvard Business Review (HBR) calls “discretionary thrift”. Some people have to be thrifty through necessity – but a growing stratum of more affluent consumers are economising, too.

The HBR study notes that, “Our research among more affluent consumers has revealed mounting dissatisfaction with excessive consumption … They’re recycling more, buying used goods, and imbuing their children with traditional values.”

Monitoring consumer sentiment and behaviour is vital. Otherwise you can end up in a situation like furniture manufacturer and retailer Made.com. It bought excess stock in anticipation of a consumer spending boom. But instead, customers reined in spending and left Made severely over-leveraged.

Spend management

During times of growth and economic prosperity, it’s easy to overlook things like expenses. A little here and a little there is more acceptable when things are going well.

A recession brings leaky T&E into sharp relief, however. Suddenly, every penny counts and employee habits might take a while to catch up.

For finance leaders, it’s a balancing act. It’s time to reassert a firm grip on expenses – but without shattering fragile worker morale. Employees, naturally, don’t want to feel like they’re being monitored or watched.

And yet, you’ve got a job to do. It’s a delicate dance. Fortunately, solutions for travel and expenses have progressed a lot in recent years. There exists now a viable alternative to workers paying out of pocket, all while providing you with added control of company finances.

This control is more important than ever. As Clear Channel’s head of audit Daniel Mensah points out, “As people are under more economic pressure, the potential for fraud is higher”. That is a sad reality – but it is a reality.

A spend management solution uses prepaid expenses cards. All of it is controlled through a mobile app. Purchases are pre-cleared by your finance team and logged by the worker in the app with a copy (or picture) of the receipt.

This expense is then seamlessly reconciled in your accounts. It’s not only more resistant to fraud, but it’s also a time-saver for you and the business.

Getting through a recession

This recession will pass. Although this one has unique causes and characteristics, it remains recognisable for what it is.

You need to get beyond the mindset of ‘holding on’. There are things you can do now – strategically and technologically – to not just survive, but thrive when the upturn comes. Operational efficiency gives you room to think and act.

The finance team and the finance leader are now more important than ever. Not just to the business. Also to the workers who rely on the company for their livelihoods. Transformation and fluctuation are facts of life. These highs and lows aren’t solely destructive. They are also an opportunity to begin anew.

Visit our blog for more articles like this one or subscribe to get them direct to your inbox. Find the right Soldo plan for your business here.

Fleet Managers and Operation Managers are increasingly convincing their CFOs themselves that cash and fuel cards no longer work, as they experience on a daily basis the immense frustrations among themselves and drivers. The current economic situation and fuel crisis call for new solutions in a transport sector where mutual trust is traditionally low.

Three trends for transport companies

Drivers as well as their Finance and Operations departments experience a lot of frustration around expenses and claims. And those frustrations are increasing, as a result of three key trends for transport companies.

One is that drivers are increasingly having to fill up at other places because of the current fuel crisis. This also occurs at filling stations where the driver does not have a fuel card, while due to high inflation and economic recession, nobody wants to advance costs out of their own pocket anymore. Meanwhile, the huge staff shortage is forcing transport companies to make things easier for drivers with innovative solutions.

1. Drivers sometimes need to refuel in other places
   The current fuel crisis is making it difficult for drivers to invariably fill up at their regular locations. In other cases, the crisis makes it difficult for drivers to fill up at least at the petrol station chain for which they have a payment card. In practice, it means that drivers must swerve on the road, for instance if fuel is not available at certain locations.The war in Ukraine, current economic developments and the high price of diesel and other fuels make it attractive to fill up across the border in more advantageous countries. In other cases, it is necessary, for instance, because certain petrol stations do not have sufficient supplies. If no payment card is available for the alternative filling station, drivers and the transport companies look for alternatives. A payment card from a particular filling station then no longer offers a solution.
2. No one wants to advance out of pocket anymore
   The same economic situation and soaring prices, combined with massive inflation, are creating an additional challenge for drivers. Whereas in the past they were willing to advance unforeseen costs out of their own pockets, this is now much less common. Many drivers do not want to advance the cost, and others simply cannot advance it.They call the transport company they work for to make extra money available. Or they use an emergency envelope with cash money, which in turn the company has no control over. It leads to solutions that both drivers and the transport companies do not like, so for which they would like to find an alternative.
3. Transport companies should make it easier for drivers
   Finally, there is a lot of pressure on transport companies. The current staff shortage in several markets in Europe is leading to great difficulty in finding new drivers. Companies must try harder to attract staff, and then cannot use frustrations over expenses and allowances. It increases the urgency to act now.
   

Much frustration for drivers as well as Fleet and Operations Managers

It is mostly Fleet Managers and Operations Managers at transport companies who experience this frustration. They are often called even in the evening hours and on weekends, by drivers who need extra money on the road. This is true, for example, when they need to divert to another filling station, just as when they suddenly have to spend the night elsewhere, when they need to have a repair done or when they incur other expenses.

And even at the time when a driver only has to incur the regular costs, it leads to a lot of administration, and frustration. Drivers must keep perfectly accurate records of expenses, and then submit a claim in Excel. Or they can use a fuel card, but then it is the Operations Manager who then has to check whether transactions are all correct.

Transport companies have traditionally been reluctant to issue credit cards to drivers. Many of the drivers only work for a relatively short time with the same employer, or even do seasonal work, and therefore do not build strong and loyal bonds. Mutual trust is too fragile to give a credit card in the company’s name, which would allow the driver to pay all expenses. The fuel card is an exception to this, but it does not allow for paying for repairs, overnight stays, and fuel at non-affiliated filling stations.

Solution for (large) transport companies

At Soldo, we offer a solution that works for both (large) transport companies and drivers. Our payment solution allows drivers to settle at the transport company’s expense. That applies to fuel, as well as overnight stays, lunches, repairs, and other expenses. That is, if authorised by the company.
Thanks to restrictions on specific spending categories, certain geographical areas and in other areas, it is possible to set exactly what a driver can spend. Then the transactions are immediately visible, from one clear dashboard.

Good practices at Titans and Sendsio

These advantages is the reason why many large transport companies we work for are happy to benefit from. A good example is Titans Group. They were not looking for a fuel card because it would make them dependent on a specific fuel supplier. On the other hand, they did suffer from high expenses and temporary workers in the peak season. With Soldo, they offer their drivers a simple payment solution, combined with a smart app. This gives Titans Group full control and all the necessary insight into transactions. Drivers, on the other hand, do not have to advance anything, even if they suddenly must swerve and fill up in an unusual place.

Sendsio also chose Soldo. This makes the monthly closing a lot less time-consuming, and day-to-day management is much less burdensome for Fleet Managers and Operations Managers. For them, a declaration now takes 30 minutes, whereas previously employees spent an average of half a day on it. There are no more advances and recoveries for fuel, overnight stays, and lunches. Moreover, the company has interfaced with their SAP software. As a result, even the organisation’s CEO and COO have real-time insight into costs and keep an overview more easily

Faster and with real-time insight and overview: Soldo

At Soldo, we offer a complete, user-friendly, and convenient payment solution. Transport companies use a payment card for drivers, which they can set up themselves. This prevents drivers from having to advance costs themselves or becoming dependent on specific suppliers for fuel, for example. It is no longer necessary to provide a credit card, while drivers can still pay anywhere with credit card is accepted.

Thanks to real-time visibility, overview, and possible links to, for example, SAP software and ERP systems, all data are always easily available. Links with the existing accounting software, for example, ensure that transactions are immediately entered correctly in the administration.

Would you like to know more about how Titans Group and Sendsio use our payment solutions? Or are you curious how your company can benefit from this? Together with my colleagues, I will be happy to explain it to you, even if, as a Fleet Manager or Operations Manager, you would like to do the talking yourself to convince your organisation’s CFO.

Check out Soldo.com or book a free, no-obligation demo to experience it for yourself straight away.

How do you control fuel costs made by drivers when they are on the road, across borders, or even in different time zones? It is a challenge many transport companies face. Asking drivers to pay out of their own pocket leads to frustration, and corporate credit cards require a lot of paperwork. There’s an easier, more efficient way to manage these expenses. 

Sometimes, transport companies can resemble administration offices. Operations and finance departments work overtime to process and check all (fuel) payments. Meanwhile, drivers must pay large sums of money out of pocket to do their jobs, save receipts, fill out forms, and wait to be reimbursed.

To add to these challenges, diesel prices have become a huge issue for transport companies. And according to current fuel monitors, there’s not much hope of improvement.

Paying in cash or with prepaid fuel cards

Fuel payments and other business expenses are often disregarded in favour of operation and logistic improvements.

As a result, too many companies with fleets of over 100 vehicles still allow drivers to pay for fuel themselves or with prepaid fuel cards. However, these debit cards are often restricted and come with a lot of limitations, causing dissatisfaction among drivers. These restrictions also make it difficult to cover overnight stays, road repairs, or parking fees.

This solution doesn’t benefit fleet managers and financial controllers either, and may even put the company at risk. Cash payments can encourage fraud, corporate credit cards are often misused, receipts get lost, and there’s no way to track spending in real time.

Admin hassles

For transport companies, accounting can be complex – even if it’s just about fuel costs. It causes a great deal of frustration among drivers, accountants, fleet managers, and eventually CFOs.

Drivers have trouble managing expenses without having to work overtime on a daily basis. Especially when they’re on the road and have to fill up their vehicles – often across borders and sometimes in other time zones. This admin work involves processing payments, managing cash expenses, and processing claims in the company’s accounting system.

Accountants, fleet managers, operations managers, and even drivers waste too much time on these tasks, all at the expense of productivity. These unproductive hours cost money, and can’t be spent on their ultimate goal: getting from point A to point B.

Drivers must also prove what they have spent in cash, which adds to the hassle. Cash payments are hard to verify, but they keep them going and relieve the administrative burden. Checks may prevent business fraud, but they undermine the trust of those making the payments.

Top 5 benefits of using Soldo

Transport companies such as Titans, Girteka, Gruber Logistics, and Wallenborn all chose Soldo because it offered them at least one of these five advantages:

1. Easy payments for fuel and more

With a smart payment card which drivers can use for fuel as well as other expenses, there’s no need to go out of pocket while on the road. They don’t have to use a business credit card and provide guarantees or collateral in exchange. They charge just as easily for overnight accommodation, repairs and parking costs – even in different geographical locations.

2. Real-time view of costs

Soldo gives accountants, fleet managers and operations managers real-time insight into drivers’ costs while they’re on the road. They get a notification whenever a transaction happens, and can instantly top up drivers with only a few clicks.

3. Flexible spending and limits

Smart payment cards make it possible to set what drivers are allowed to spend in a way that works for you. You can choose what type of expenses employees can make, and where (such as specific merchants of geo-locations). This gives you total control over fuel costs and other business expenses while drivers are in transit, even in different countries.

4. All expenses in one place

You can track and manage all fuel and business expenses at once with the Soldo platform. It shows you all incurred costs in detail, whether costs are rising and where savings opportunities exist. And thanks to our auto-tagging feature, payments will be automatically sorted by category.

5. Increased security

Replacing cash with smart payment cards for expenses greatly reduces the risk of false claims and fraud. Moreover, should employees fail to comply with rules and regulations, you can easily lock their cards to disable spending and switch off cash withdrawals.

Smart payment cards with flexible options

Looking for a way to combine all the benefits of a business credit card with a system that saves you a tonne of admin headaches? Give drivers and other employees a physical card as well as a virtual alternative. Virtual cards are great for ad-hoc and online payments, for instance.

Soldo is the all-in-one management platform your transport company needs. Stay on top of every penny while saving time, and boost employee satisfaction.

We’ve got some exciting news! After a lot of careful thinking and hard work behind the scenes, we’re thrilled to have launched a shiny new range of Soldo plans.

In this article, we’ll cover everything you need to know about our new plans, including:

• Why we’ve launched new plans
• What’s included in our new plans
• How you can move to a new plan

Before we dive in though, we wanted to make two things very clear.

Firstly, these aren’t just new plans for new customers. All existing customers can move straight over to a new plan – whether that’s a simple old-to-new switch or an upgrade to the next plan level.

And secondly, you can find even more detailed information about our new plans by heading over to the dedicated FAQs page on our website.

The thinking behind our new plans

We’ve launched new plans for a simple, yet crucially important, reason: to better serve your needs.

As a business, we’re committed to continuous improvement and constantly evolving to meet our customers’ changing needs. Our new plans are designed to give you even more value and the best possible experience from Soldo.

The plans include a range of exciting new features (more on these below) that put you firmly in the driver’s seat. Advanced control means managing all your company and employee expenses in one place – increased flexibility means doing that in a way that suits you and your business.

No more messy switching between systems and spreadsheets. From splitting payments into multiple transactions and managing out-of-pocket expenses, to identifying and controlling out-of-policy spending. Everything you need to oversee every business expense, ready and waiting for you in Soldo.

Importantly, all of the new and improved features we roll out now and in the future are exclusively available on our new plans…watch this space for outbound transfers coming early 2023.

Let’s talk about the new features

The new features we’ve launched (and the adjustments we’ve made to existing ones) better reflect the needs of our customers today. And that’s just the beginning of a whole roadmap of features that we’re rolling out exclusively for our new plans in the coming months – and long into the future.

With these features, our new plans unlock a truly end-to-end, integrated company spend and employee expense management experience.

To get a better idea of what that means in practice, let’s take a look at some of the features exclusively available on our new plans as well as a few key adjustments.

Spotlight on our new Pro plan

When you move to our new Pro plan, you’ll get:

• Access to brand new expense management features you can use to review, track and classify expenses into customisable categories that make sense for your business
• Three cards for subscriptions/online ads included in the price of your plan, plus a dedicated dashboard to give you complete visibility
• More control over ad-hoc spending with five temporary virtual cards per month included in your plan, valid for seven days and up to 10 purchases
• The flexibility to add between three and 20 users to your account with a card for every user included and up to 30 cards available

We’ve made a few adjustments to make sure the features are better aligned to each plan. For example, transaction reporting and auto-tagging will now be available from our Premium plan level.

Spotlight on our new Premium plan

Our new Premium plan includes five cards for subscription/online ads and 10 temporary virtual cards for pre-approved spend per month. You can add between three and 30 users, each with their own card included and up to 40 cards available.

The best part about moving or upgrading to a new Premium plan is exclusive access to our full expense management suite, meaning you can:

• Add out-of-pocket expenses to Soldo, so you can track and manage all company spending in one place
• Split single transactions into several with the right amount of money attributed to the right employee to get more accurate reporting
• Add spending policy profiles directly to Soldo and run reports that highlight any transactions that fall outside of them to easily identify and manage out-of-policy expenses
• Categorise transactions, so employees can classify payments into categories you’ve defined to suit your needs

On all our new plans

You’ll pay a monthly fee on our new plans. This is based on the number of users on your Soldo account, instead of the number of cards. Monthly fees start from a minimum of three users and every user has a card included.

Check out our pricing page for all the details.

How soon can you move to a new plan?

You can move to a new plan right now in four simple steps:

1. Log in to your Soldo account
2. Go to Company info
3. Open the Soldo plans tab
4. Select the new plan you’d like to move to

When you move to a new plan, we’ll make the change immediately, starting from the current billing period. If you decide to move to a different plan at any time after 24 October 2022, only our new plans will be available.

We recommend moving as soon as possible to start getting the most value from Soldo. You’ll instantly unlock your exclusive access to new and upcoming features only available on our new plans.

Log in now to get started or head to our pricing page to choose the best new plan for your business.

This episode of the CFO Playbook features an interview with Alwyn Jones, Group CFO at Luno, a leading global cryptocurrency company with over 9 million customers in 43 countries that provides services for making it safe and easy to buy, store and learn about cryptocurrencies.

In this episode, Alwyn talks about the novel and evolving space of cryptocurrency and blockchain. He shares advice on retaining and hiring in a nascent industry,  as well as starting an app based bank from scratch. Alwyn also discusses the importance of building personal resilience and embracing the latest financial technology to improve performance.

Building a bank from scratch

Cryptocurrency can be an ambiguous concept. As a leader in a novel financial services sector, there aren’t many preset rules or regulations to follow. While things could seemingly be great at one moment, there could be complete turmoil the next. Upcoming CFOs should be ready for a completely different challenge in this industry.

“Every day is different. Every day could be a curious mix between wild elation of what’s been achieved and being punched in the face, sometimes in the space of an hour. So starting from scratch, it’s a bit of a truism, but you are doing everything for the first time, in many cases.”

Open dialogue among leaders

Uncertainty in a new sector can be troubling, especially for a single leader in the C-suite. Consistent and clear communication among leaders of a company make navigating an evolving space like crypto much more manageable.

“[Cryptocurrency] is definitely becoming more mainstream. I think four or five years ago you could have ignored this. I think now as CFO you need to be at least having a view and having maybe a dialogue with your board about what we should be doing in this space and how we can leverage and harness that technology.”

 

The importance of independent team members

Leaders cannot succeed without a team to follow. It’s just as important to have an open dialogue with your team as much as it is with your board. You want to hire and retain valuable team members who aren’t entirely co-dependent on your every word. In a nascent space such as crypto, it’s hard to source candidates based solely on work experience because it is still an emerging sector.

“You need to hire people who can thrive in that environment, like uncertainty, very much able to shape something independently and move it forward without necessarily having a plan or a playbook or a set of rules for how it gets done.”

 

Progression through adopting new technology

It is important to provide your team with the right tools to succeed in their positions independently. Sometimes new technologies can seem daunting, but taking the time and resources to adopt new tech into the structure of a team can be crucial for progression.

“What technology can do for finance teams, be it, are you using an outsourced ledger system? Are you using a system and a plan? Are you putting all your data in the cloud? All of this technology increases control, increases fidelity, increases speed, and that is priceless in the environments that we’re dealing in.”

We’ve got some exciting news! After a lot of careful thinking and hard work behind the scenes, we’re thrilled to have launched a shiny new range of Soldo plans.

In this article, we’ll cover everything you need to know about our new plans, including:

• Why we’ve launched new plans
• What’s included in our new plans
• How you can move to a new plan

Before we dive in though, we wanted to make two things very clear.

Firstly, these aren’t just new plans for new customers. All existing customers can move straight over to a new plan – whether that’s a simple old-to-new switch or an upgrade to the next plan level.

And secondly, you can find even more detailed information about our new plans by heading over to the dedicated FAQs page on our website.

The thinking behind our new plans

We’ve launched new plans for a simple, yet crucially important, reason: to better serve your needs.

As a business, we’re committed to continuous improvement and constantly evolving to meet our customers’ changing needs. Our new plans are designed to give you even more value and the best possible experience from Soldo.

The plans include a range of exciting new features (more on these below) that put you firmly in the driver’s seat. Advanced control means managing all your company and employee expenses in one place – increased flexibility means doing that in a way that suits you and your business.

No more messy switching between systems and spreadsheets. From splitting payments into multiple transactions and managing out-of-pocket expenses, to identifying and controlling out-of-policy spending. Everything you need to oversee every business expense, ready and waiting for you in Soldo.

Importantly, all of the new and improved features we roll out now and in the future are exclusively available on our new plans…watch this space for outbound transfers coming early 2023.

Let’s talk about the new features

The new features we’ve launched (and the adjustments we’ve made to existing ones) better reflect the needs of our customers today. And that’s just the beginning of a whole roadmap of features that we’re rolling out exclusively for our new plans in the coming months – and long into the future.

With these features, our new plans unlock a truly end-to-end, integrated company spend and employee expense management experience.

To get a better idea of what that means in practice, let’s take a look at some of the features exclusively available on our new plans as well as a few key adjustments.

Spotlight on our new Pro plan

When you move to our new Pro plan, you’ll get:

• Access to brand new expense management features you can use to review, track and classify expenses into customisable categories that make sense for your business
• Three cards for subscriptions/online ads included in the price of your plan, plus a dedicated dashboard to give you complete visibility
• More control over ad-hoc spending with five temporary virtual cards per month included in your plan, valid for seven days and up to 10 purchases
• The flexibility to add between three and 20 users to your account with a card for every user included and up to 30 cards available

We’ve made a few adjustments to make sure the features are better aligned to each plan. For example, transaction reporting and auto-tagging will now be available from our Premium plan level.

Spotlight on our new Premium plan

Our new Premium plan includes five cards for subscription/online ads and 10 temporary virtual cards for pre-approved spend per month. You can add between three and 30 users, each with their own card included and up to 40 cards available.

The best part about moving or upgrading to a new Premium plan is exclusive access to our full expense management suite, meaning you can:

• Add out-of-pocket expenses to Soldo, so you can track and manage all company spending in one place
• Split single transactions into several with the right amount of money attributed to the right employee to get more accurate reporting
• Add spending policy profiles directly to Soldo and run reports that highlight any transactions that fall outside of them to easily identify and manage out-of-policy expenses
• Categorise transactions, so employees can classify payments into categories you’ve defined to suit your needs

On all our new plans

You’ll pay a monthly fee on our new plans. This is based on the number of users on your Soldo account, instead of the number of cards. Monthly fees start from a minimum of three users and every user has a card included.

Check out our pricing page for all the details.

How soon can you move to a new plan?

You can move to a new plan right now in four simple steps:

1. Log in to your Soldo account
2. Go to Company info
3. Open the Soldo plans tab
4. Select the new plan you’d like to move to

When you move to a new plan, we’ll make the change immediately, starting from the current billing period. If you decide to move to a different plan at any time after 24 October 2022, only our new plans will be available.

We recommend moving as soon as possible to start getting the most value from Soldo. You’ll instantly unlock your exclusive access to new and upcoming features only available on our new plans.

Log in now to get started or head to our pricing page to choose the best new plan for your business.

We’ve got some exciting news! After a lot of careful thinking and hard work behind the scenes, we’re thrilled to have launched a shiny new range of Soldo plans.

In this article, we’ll cover everything you need to know about our new plans, including:

• Why we’ve launched new plans
• What’s included in our new plans
• How you can move to a new plan

Before we dive in though, we wanted to make two things very clear.

Firstly, these aren’t just new plans for new customers. All existing customers can move straight over to a new plan – whether that’s a simple old-to-new switch or an upgrade to the next plan level.

And secondly, you can find even more detailed information about our new plans by heading over to the dedicated FAQs page on our website.

The thinking behind our new plans

We’ve launched new plans for a simple, yet crucially important, reason: to better serve your needs.

As a business, we’re committed to continuous improvement and constantly evolving to meet our customers’ changing needs. Our new plans are designed to give you even more value and the best possible experience from Soldo.

The plans include a range of exciting new features (more on these below) that put you firmly in the driver’s seat. Advanced control means managing all your company and employee expenses in one place – increased flexibility means doing that in a way that suits you and your business.

No more messy switching between systems and spreadsheets. From splitting payments into multiple transactions and managing out-of-pocket expenses, to identifying and controlling out-of-policy spending. Everything you need to oversee every business expense, ready and waiting for you in Soldo.

Importantly, all of the new and improved features we roll out now and in the future are exclusively available on our new plans…watch this space for outbound transfers coming early 2023.

Let’s talk about the new features

The new features we’ve launched (and the adjustments we’ve made to existing ones) better reflect the needs of our customers today. And that’s just the beginning of a whole roadmap of features that we’re rolling out exclusively for our new plans in the coming months – and long into the future.

With these features, our new plans unlock a truly end-to-end, integrated company spend and employee expense management experience.

To get a better idea of what that means in practice, let’s take a look at some of the features exclusively available on our new plans as well as a few key adjustments.

Spotlight on our new Pro plan

When you move to our new Pro plan, you’ll get:

• Access to brand new expense management features you can use to review, track and classify expenses into customisable categories that make sense for your business
• Three cards for subscriptions/online ads included in the price of your plan, plus a dedicated dashboard to give you complete visibility
• More control over ad-hoc spending with five temporary virtual cards per month included in your plan, valid for seven days and up to 10 purchases
• The flexibility to add between three and 20 users to your account with a card for every user included and up to 30 cards available

We’ve made a few adjustments to make sure the features are better aligned to each plan. For example, transaction reporting and auto-tagging will now be available from our Premium plan level.

Spotlight on our new Premium plan

Our new Premium plan includes five cards for subscription/online ads and 10 temporary virtual cards for pre-approved spend per month. You can add between three and 30 users, each with their own card included and up to 40 cards available.

The best part about moving or upgrading to a new Premium plan is exclusive access to our full expense management suite, meaning you can:

• Add out-of-pocket expenses to Soldo, so you can track and manage all company spending in one place
• Split single transactions into several with the right amount of money attributed to the right employee to get more accurate reporting
• Add spending policy profiles directly to Soldo and run reports that highlight any transactions that fall outside of them to easily identify and manage out-of-policy expenses
• Categorise transactions, so employees can classify payments into categories you’ve defined to suit your needs

On all our new plans

You’ll pay a monthly fee on our new plans. This is based on the number of users on your Soldo account, instead of the number of cards. Monthly fees start from a minimum of three users and every user has a card included.

Check out our pricing page for all the details.

How soon can you move to a new plan?

You can move to a new plan right now in four simple steps:

1. Log in to your Soldo account
2. Go to Company info
3. Open the Soldo plans tab
4. Select the new plan you’d like to move to

When you move to a new plan, we’ll make the change immediately, starting from the current billing period. If you decide to move to a different plan at any time after 24 October 2022, only our new plans will be available.

We recommend moving as soon as possible to start getting the most value from Soldo. You’ll instantly unlock your exclusive access to new and upcoming features only available on our new plans.

Log in now to get started or head to our pricing page to choose the best new plan for your business.