this is probably a dumb question but we are a new small business & we are wondering if we can use a company like Brex, Mercury, TransferWise, etc as a Bank for our business or do we NEED to establish a real bank account for our business? We prefer this but aren't sure. Thank you!
Great question and great timing. We are really close to publishing a video that reviews Neobanks. Short answer is you can absolutely use one of these to run your business. We will be going through the pros and cons in that video which should be published in the next few weeks.
After chatting with Brex support, this is what I received. They do ask for your EIN and submit to the following: Experian, Dun & Bradstreet and Equifax. See this Brex blog for additional info on business credit: www.brex.com/blog/business-credit-score/
out of Brex, Mercury & TransferWise - which company would you suggest the most for a small business to bank with? we just got denied by Brex in our application process & they didn't inform us as to why. So frustrating..
Hi, we are non-US citizens and we opened an LLC, we live in Ecuador, and we're registered in WY. The company that created our business online (First Base) suggest Brex as a bank, my questions are: do you know if we can receive our credit card overseas (physical one) and if these accounts are friendly to open a Paypal account? and last, do you know if as an LLC we can open multiple accounts instead of just one? Many thanks in advance! Great video!
OK, here is what we found. There isn't a clear answer. From the Brex Card page "Brex is available to corporations and other forms of non-individual liability companies. Brex underwrites with Employer Identification Numbers (EINs), not Social Security Numbers, so consumers, sole proprietors, and other unregistered businesses are ineligible. Only companies organized and registered in the United States (such as C-corps, S-corps, LLCs, or LLPs) may apply for a Brex account. Consumers, sole proprietors, unincorporated partnerships, and companies registered outside the United States are not permitted to use, or attempt to open or use, a Brex account. There are also some prohibited activities and businesses that Brex cannot support." We tried to get clarification from Brex support and they told us the following: "There are some industries that aren’t eligible for Brex accounts but we do not have exhaustive lists of who can and can't apply. The best way to find out would be to start the application process and see if the business fits our requirements." The application is fairly straight forward so you could apply and see what happens.
For a business, do banks usually dislike credit repair companies or they don't really care as long as you have a relationship with them and pay off credit cards on time?
Brex will do underwriting to determine your credit limit. Look at these two articles for more details: - www.brex.com/support/brex-credit-limits -www.brex.com/support/company-credit-limit
Brex does not have the ability to split a transaction, but you could do that in the accounting software once it syncs. There isn't a report feature, but there is a review capability. You could also route Brex to an expense management app like Expensify if you needed the full approval workflow.
Brex has been great. The only negative thing we've seen over the years was their move away from small business. They did a purge of small businesses in 2022 and only focus on startups and scaling businesses now. See www.brex.com/support/what-are-the-requirements-for-brex for their requirements.
Every product has some downsides. The biggest thing a business needs to consider with Brex is the variable nature of the credit limit as it is tied to bank balances. This generally isn't an issue as most businesses aren't putting their entire bank balance on credit cards, but something to watch for those that are utilizing a lot of credit.
