Simplifying Global
Commerce for
a Fast-Growing Livecommerce
Industry: Livestream Retail | Business Type: eCommerce
Meet Shopeak: Bringing the World’s Best Deals Closer to Home
Shopeak is a fast-growing social commerce brand that brings global shopping directly to consumers. Through engaging livestreams, Shopeak connects shoppers with hard-to-find items from Korea’s latest fashion drops to Europe’s niche designers.
But behind the scenes, processing a growing volume of international transactions weekly across multiple countries and currencies was becoming a major burden for their lean finance team.
The Challenges: When Growth Outpaces Operations
As Shopeak’s popularity surged, their finance team struggled to keep pace with the increasing volume and complexity of transactions:
Time-Consuming Reconciliation
With daily streams, the task of tracking and matching numerous international purchases across various cards and currencies was incredibly time-consuming. The finance team spent hours manually each day sifting through statements to reconcile transactions, diverting their focus from strategic activities.
Costly Currency Exchanges
Dealing with overseas retailers also meant frequent currency conversions. Traditional banking solutions offered unfavorable exchange rates and lacked transparency, making it difficult for Shopeak to optimise currency conversions. Bogged down by the fees, Shopeak’s profitability was significantly impacted.
The Solution: YouBiz’s Integrated Financial Platform
YouBiz provided the financial infrastructure Shopeak needed to scale with confidence:
Streamlined Multi-Currency Management
YouBiz’s multi-currency wallets allowed Shopeak to hold and manage funds in various currencies. By issuing corporate cards to specific team members linked to these wallets, they gained clear, real-time visibility into spending by country and cardholder, eliminating the cumbersome manual tracking of individual transactions.
Automated Accounting with Xero Integration
The seamless, direct integration between YouBiz and Shopeak’s accounting software, Xero, automated the synchronization of all transactions. This eliminated the need for manual data entry and ensured accurate, effortless reconciliation – a process that previously consumed hours daily.
Better Rates, More Savings
Switching from credit cards to YouBiz gave Shopeak access to better exchange rates and real 0% FX fees. With the high volume of overseas transactions, this directly translates to substantial savings. Plus, with 1% cashback on every transaction, they’re saving more with every purchase.
“The exchange rates are better and there are no transaction fees. There’s also the 1% cashback. Plus, we can monitor spending on a wallet basis and split by country, which you can’t do with credit cards.”
Founder, Shopeak Store
The Impact: More Time, More Savings, More Growth
The transition to YouBiz delivered measurable results:
- 72 Hours Monthly Reclaimed:
By automating reconciliation, the finance team gained back three full workdays each month. This freed up time to focus on more strategic initiatives such as customer experience improvements. - Significant Monthly Cost Reduction:
Leveraging YouBiz’s better exchange rates and fee-less corporate cards, Shopeak saves significantly on overseas payments, amounting to around S$5,000 annually.
Key Takeaways: Advice for Scaling Businesses
- Keep an open mind: Be flexible and adapt to changes. Build a flexible system that could handle complexity without breaking as you scale.
- Embrace Automation to Enhance Efficiency: Automating manual tasks, especially in finance, frees up valuable time and reduces the risk of errors, allowing the team to focus on strategic priorities and drive business growth.
“Even if you plan everything, it almost never goes as planned. You need to have your core structure — like how you manage spending or logistics — but you must stay open to change.”
Founder, Shopeak Store