How growing businesses lose sight of their spending

“How much did we spend on contractors last quarter?” the CEO asks in a leadership meeting.  

“I’ll follow up with that information,” you reply, leaving out the part about needing a week to find out.  

The costs are scattered across five teams and each team spends money in a different way. Two used an existing supplier list. One paid with a company credit card. One raised a purchase order. One paid out of pocket and requested reimbursement. 

The number exists – it’s just going to take a while to find. 

Sound familiar? 

Accountability for decisions 

You approved the budget for the new AI tool and banner at last week’s trade show. But you don’t know how much the banner costs, nor when the AI tool renews…  

Turns out another team is already running the same AI tool and the banner was out of budget.  

This kind of fragmented spend hinders visibility until month-end and creates unexpected costs. In fact, 35% of finance teams frequently experience surprises at month-end due to rushed, error-prone manual work. It also means the team spends time connecting the dots rather than focusing on more valuable, strategic work.  

Shay Murtagh Precast, an Irish construction company, used to spend a week every month chasing and sorting receipts. “Processes that previously would have taken our finance team a week a month, now take half a day thanks to Soldo,” said Gillian Murtagh, Owner & Shared Services Director 

Why it was built that way 

When the business was 20 people, it was straightforward. Since then, the business has tripled in size, creating new teams, adding more sites and taking on bigger projects. You gave the new marketing director a budget, so they didn’t contact you over every invoice. Then, you gave the site managers a card to buy items locally instead of waiting weeks for a decision on a £60 part. 

And that was the best thing to do at the time. When people can’t access company money in time, they find another way to get it. Soldo’s 2026 Productivity at Work research found that 60% admit to bending the rules to access company money.  

A quick non-fix 

So you added steps. Purchases over a certain amount require your approval, new suppliers require sign-off and expense claims need checking.  

Control improved, but you also became the bottleneck. 

Your sales team says the procurement process takes too long, while operations says the expense policy does not work for them. To operate competitively, they must be able to spend what they need. 

It’s a problem shared by many businesses. In fact, two-thirds of business leaders say their organisations are overly complex and inefficient and nearly 40% think redefining how work flows through the business is the greatest improvement available to them. 

In growing businesses, this usually starts with high-frequency, everyday spending that’s ungoverned, such as employee expenses, supplier payments and project budgets that have outgrown the controls built for them. 

Set your limits first 

The fix is to allow people to spend without asking you, within limits you set in advance.  

With Soldo, you set a budget for a team, project or location and issue cards with your rules. Your site manager can buy a £60 part, but cannot buy a flight because the rules won’t let them. Every transaction is coded to a cost centre and matched to a receipt, ready to post to your accounting system or ERP, rather than a statement someone must re-key. 

So the next time the CEO asks about contractor spend, you’ll have the answer in minutes.