Key takeaways
- FreeAgent records a company card as a credit card account, fed by a bank feed, statement upload or manual entry.
- Every transaction must be explained with a type, category and VAT rate.
- Smart Capture reads receipts in the mobile app and matches them to transactions, with 10 a month included.
- Vergo proposes each explanation from your history and writes it through FreeAgent's API.
Where should you go next?
- Vergo's FreeAgent integration
- What expense management software integrates with FreeAgent?
- Get started with Vergo
How do you automate expense management in FreeAgent, step by step?
- Connect FreeAgent. Vergo connects directly through FreeAgent's public API, explains each card transaction with its category, VAT rate and project, and records out-of-pocket spend as expenses for the user.
- Connect your existing cards. Connecting your existing cards involves no card applications, no re-issuing and no banking change.
- Collect receipts by text. Employees handle everything by text message — no app to download, no portal login — and Vergo chases missing receipts itself instead of waiting for a report.
- Propose the explanation. Vergo proposes category, VAT rate and, for client work, the project to rebill.
- Explain in FreeAgent. Once confirmed, the transaction is explained, and the unexplained count goes down on its own.
What does FreeAgent need to explain a card transaction?
- Type: payment, bill payment, money paid to user, and others.
- Category, including your custom categories.
- VAT rate, for VAT-registered businesses.
- Project, where the cost is rebilled to a client.
Where does FreeAgent stop and automation start?
FreeAgent is tidy for a freelancer: Smart Capture reads the date and amount, suggests a category and matches the receipt to a bank transaction for up to seven days. For a team with several cards, the included allowance runs out and the suggestion is based on the receipt, not on how you explained similar spend. Vergo reads the receipt itself, line by line, and predicts the GL account from what was actually bought, not just the vendor name on the header.
A practical example
A digital agency on FreeAgent has five company cards. A designer buys stock images for a client and a software subscription for the studio. Vergo texts for the receipts, proposes the images to the client project as rebillable at cost and the subscription to software, with the VAT rates used before. The director confirms and both transactions are explained in FreeAgent.
How Vergo handles this
Vergo proposes the coding by inference from your own accounting structure and history — no rule library to build, no keyword lists to maintain, and new vendors are coded on first sight. For FreeAgent, that includes which spend your team rebilled to projects, so client costs are not buried in overheads. Every coding shows why it was chosen, so a reviewer confirms in seconds instead of re-coding by hand. Approval workflows are optional and fit how you already control spend: route by GL account or by amount — or skip approval flows entirely and let policy flags catch only what breaks a rule.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do we need Smart Capture Unlimited with Vergo?
No. Vergo reads receipts itself.
Can Vergo explain transactions in FreeAgent?
Yes, through FreeAgent's public API, with category, VAT rate and project.
Does Vergo record out-of-pocket expenses?
Yes, as expenses for the user who paid.
Does our accountant see the explanations?
Yes. They are ordinary FreeAgent explanations.
Do we need new cards?
No. Connecting your existing cards involves no card applications, no re-issuing and no banking change.
