Banking alternative Revolut saves 16,000 companies over £1m, but how?

Revolut, an app-based banking alternative, has today (October 26) announced that it has signed up 16,000 companies to its business accounts across the UK and Europe since launching in June.

The service allows companies to sign up for multi-currency accounts in minutes, issue corporate cards, make free money transfers in 26 currencies to pay suppliers or employees overseas - all at the interbank exchange rate.

In addition, Revolut has launched the Revolut for Business Open API to allow customers to automate these processes from their own systems. This will allow businesses to make instant, mass-payouts globally.

Nikolay Storonsky, founder and CEO of Revolut, commented: “Revolut for Business was born out of our frustrations with the pains of opening and managing business accounts in the UK and abroad.

“Businesses were being offered poor deals with hidden exchange fees, coupled with the problems they faced with complicated, slow platform interfaces. Therefore we are delighted to offer a cheaper, simpler, and faster alternative that supports businesses as they deliver goods and services, and are looking forward to signing up 20,000 businesses by 2018.”

Existing business users have already sent over £25.3m worth of transfers since the service launched in June, with over 4,150 businesses signing up in June alone. This was a record month for Revolut, while saving UK and European businesses over £1m in in exchange rates and transfer fees.

The growth has largely been fuelled by frustration at existing banks that offer poor exchange rates and levy a variety of hidden charges.

To combat this, Revolut aims to offer businesses the interbank rate and has built a clear, user-friendly platform to move and manage their money globally in multiple currencies, designed to meet the needs of businesses of today.

Business account features include free and instant money transfers between companies that are signed up to Revolut for Business, real-time spending notifications and dedicated customer support.

The company is planning more additions to the platform, such as issuing unique corporate cards to employees for global fee-free spending, integrating popular accounting software such as Xero, and creating business merchant accounts so companies can accept payments directly from customers around the world without the burden of excessive FX fees.

Kwame Agyei, head of finance at UNILAD, added: “Revolut for Business has been hugely important to our financial operations, allowing us to fully benefit from the savings on our international money transfers.

“Our in-house production team can each use a single card for both domestic and international shoots, while the single platform with a clear user breakdown makes the audit trail a breeze to follow.”

London-based Revolut launched nearly two years ago and has acquired more than 900,000 customers with its consumer service, allowing customers to open a current account in around 60 seconds.