Corpay has launched an AI-powered Virtual Assistant within Corpay Complete for UK finance teams.
The US-based corporate payments company has made the tool available to all new and existing UK customers, following research it commissioned into how finance teams in the UK manage day-to-day spend administration.
Research points to manual workload
The research, conducted among 300 UK CFOs, found that 86% of finance teams spend six or more hours per person, per week, on expense, invoice, and supplier payment administration. Separately, 83% of respondents said their spend processes remain more manual than they should be. Corpay has positioned the Virtual Assistant as a direct response to this administrative burden.
The Virtual Assistant allows finance teams to ask questions in plain language about card spend, expenses, supplier payments and approvals. Rather than searching manually through the platform, users receive reports, tasks and information directly in response to their queries.
Platform capabilities
According to Corpay, the tool allows finance teams to surface card spend by department, merchant or month, locate expense reports awaiting approval, and identify card transactions missing receipts. It can also be used to review Virtual Cards pending approval, check the status of supplier payments and invoices under review, and generate reports and spend summaries without manual searching.
Users can additionally ask the Virtual Assistant to approve actions on their behalf. Corpay has stated that every supported action still requires user confirmation before anything is approved, rejected, submitted or changed, with access governed by each user's role and permissions within the platform.
The Virtual Assistant sits within Corpay Complete, which combines corporate cards, virtual cards, accounts payable automation and cross-border payments in a single platform that integrates with existing ERP systems. Corpay has described the launch as part of a broader push, under the Corpay AI umbrella, to let finance teams access information, reports, and approval workflows through plain-language queries rather than manual platform navigation.
Piero Macari, Vice President of Products at Corpay, said the tool is intended to help finance teams find relevant information, whether a report, a spend pattern or an approval task, more quickly, allowing more time for action rather than searching.
Implications for finance teams
The launch reflects a wider trend among corporate payments and spend management providers to embed conversational AI interfaces into existing platforms, aiming to reduce time spent on manual administrative tasks such as approvals, reconciliation and reporting. For UK finance teams, the research findings suggest that manual administration remains a significant draw on time despite existing platform capabilities, a gap Corpay is seeking to address through natural-language automation while retaining manual sign-off on all actions.
