Ramp, Expensify, Brex... and the Missing Link in Travel Spend

Travel & expense is broken when travel and spend live in separate tools. Let’s fix that.

Boarding Call šŸš€

ā€œExpense chaos is optional. Modern T&E tools cut overspend, speed reimbursements, and give Finance real control. Ramp, Expensify, Brex—yes. But what if it all lived inside your travel platform?ā€

The CFO’s Travel Problem

Fix It with Integrated Cost Management 

If your company books travel, you have travel & expense—whether you manage it or pay the bills later. Lost receipts, out-of-policy hotels, surprise spend, slow reimbursements… sound familiar?

Good news: modern Travel & Expense (T&E) cost management tools actually work. They automate receipt capture, enforce policy before spend, connect to corporate cards, and give finance real-time visibility. Below, we break down why you need one, what’s on the market (Ramp, Expensify, Brex, Concur, Divvy/Bill), and how Travel Code now brings T&E inside your travel stack—no more stitched-together spreadsheets.

šŸ”Ž Why You Need Modern T&E (Even If You Think You Don’t)

Top 5 reasons CFOs & travel managers upgrade:

  1. Real-time budget control (not 30 days later in AP).

  2. Lower total travel spend when policy limits apply before the trip.

  3. Faster reimbursements → happier travelers, less HR noise.

  4. Tax & VAT recovery you’re probably leaving on the table.

  5. Less manual finance work—goodbye spreadsheet weekends.

🧰 What Modern T&E Platforms Do

Pain

Old Way

Modern T&E Fix

Receipts disappear

Excel + inbox search

Snap photo / forward email → auto OCR & match

No idea what’s ā€œapprovedā€

Manual signoffs

Pre-trip approvals + per-diem & project caps

Out-of-policy surprises

ā€œJust reimburse itā€

Hard/soft policy limits + alerts

Everyone uses different cards

Impossible reconciliation

Corporate / virtual cards linked to categories

Weeks to reimburse

Employee frustration

Auto-match card txn → instant reimbursement

No VAT reclaim

Lost money

Structured data export for tax teams

šŸ¢ The Landscape: Leading Expense Platforms (Quick Guide)

  • Ramp – Corporate cards + real-time spend controls + automation. Loved by finance teams scaling fast.

  • Brex – Built for startups & global scale; strong multi-currency & spend analytics; plus rewards ecosystem.

  • Expensify – One of the OGs; great mobile receipt capture; good for SMB to mid-market.

  • Divvy (Bill) – Budgeting + virtual cards + straightforward expense workflows; strong SMB adoption.

  • Concur (SAP) – Enterprise heavyweight; broad feature set; global compliance; heavy lift to implement & maintain.

What they have in common: They exist because companies were drowning in manual expense reports.

Where gaps remain: Deep integration with live travel bookings, negotiated rates, re-booking savings, and localized DMC (destination management company) support in secondary markets.

🧩 Big Market Gap: Travel ≠ Expense

Most companies still split tools: travel is booked in one place (or many), while expenses are reconciled somewhere else.

What breaks when systems split?

  • Duplicate bookings & shadow spend

  • Out-of-policy travel reimbursed after the fact

  • Finance can’t link what was booked to what was paid

  • Lost VAT, missed negotiated hotel rates, and no tracking of unused tickets

  • Travelers are angry at slow expense reimbursement cycles

āœ… Quick Self-Check: Is It Time to Upgrade?

Mark all that apply:

☐ 10+ travelers / month
☐ Multi-country, multi-currency travel
☐ Manual expense reports take >10 min each
☐ Finance sees final spend after month-end close
☐ Frequent policy exceptions / off-platform bookings
☐ Staff complain reimbursements take too long
☐ Unsure if you reclaim VAT consistently

≄3 checks? It’s time.

šŸ”µ Introducing: Travel Code Cost Management (Integrated T&E)

We built Travel Code to manage corporate travel end-to-end. Now we’re closing the loop: travel + spend in one system.

  • Connect corporate & virtual cards; see spend in real time

  • Project / country / traveler spend limits & pre-trip approvals

  • Auto-attach receipts from email or mobile photo capture

  • Match expenses to actual bookings (air, hotel, ground, group travel)

  • Export-ready data for accounting (QuickBooks & more)

Rolling Out

  • VAT & localized tax mapping

  • Over-budget alerts to manager or finance

  • Mobile ā€œone-tap approveā€ expense flows

Why It Matters

No more reconciling bookings in one system and receipts in another. Finance, travel, and employees finally see the same trip data.

lts We’re Seeing

  • Up to 3Ɨ faster expense close-out after trips

  • 50% reduction in finance processing time

  • Up to 20% travel budget savings (policy + re-booking + negotiated rates)

🧠 Tie It All Together with Points Strategy

In last week’s issue we showed how the same DXB-JFK flight priced at:

  • $942 cash (portal)

  • 94k points (Amex portal)

  • 50k points + tax via partner transfer

  • 40k points + $53 via another alliance

When your travel data + spend + loyalty numbers sit in one platform, you stop leaving money (and points) behind.

šŸ‘‡ Ready to See It?

We’re opening Early Access for companies that:

  • Spend $250k+/yr on travel or

  • Want to consolidate travel + expense into one workflow or

  • Already use Travel Code and want cost visibility

—Reply to this email now

ā

Manage travel. Don’t just book it.

— Egor Karpovich, Co-Founder, Travel Code

Your Partner in Corporate Travel

Save up to 20% on corporate travel with Travel Code’s powerful tech, no legacy systems, and personal service across flights, hotels, and more. āœˆļø šŸ’›

P.S.

New here? Check our Self-Booking travel platform and share it with your colleagues.

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