Revolut, the app-based banking alternative, has today announced that it has signed up 16,000 companies to their business accounts across the UK and Europe since launching in June, and has been onboarding these customers at a rate of roughly 40 businesses a day.
The new service of the London-based startup 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 just launched the Revolut for Business Open API to allow customers to automate these processes from their own systems. This will enable businesses to make instant, mass-payouts globally.
Existing business users have already sent over €28.33 million worth of transfers since the service launched in June, with over 4,150 businesses signing up in June alone – a record month for Revolut, while saving UK and European businesses over €1.1 million 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, sometimes up to €28 for each international money transfer, coupled with complicated, slow platform interfaces. To combat this, Revolut offers 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 in the 21st Century.
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. Revolut are planning even more additions to the platform, including issuing uniquely designed 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.
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 in the UK and abroad, and are looking forward to signing up 20,000 businesses by 2018.”
London-based Revolut launched nearly two years ago and has acquired more than 900,000 customers with their consumer service, which allows customers to open a current account in 60 seconds, spend abroad in over 130 currencies with no fees, hold and exchange 26 currencies in-app and send free domestic and international money transfers with the real exchange rate. In 2016, the fintech company closed a successful Series A funding round.
