Calitem vs Pleo: supplier invoices or cards
Pleo organizes employee cards and expenses, as well as invoices. Compare that flow to the purchasing and posting controls in Calitem.
Last updated:
Short answer
Choose Calitem to automate business processes with custom workflows, including purchase checks, line-level allocations and your own approval rules. It adapts to the rules of companies and accounting firms and generates journal entries for their ERP.
Consider Pleo if you want to give your employees company cards and manage their receipts, reimbursements and mileage. It also brings together invoices and payments, with expense controls and connection to accounting.
What is Pleo and how does it work?
Pleo is a business spending platform that combines cards with software for employees and financial teams. It allows you to record purchases and receipts, apply controls and manage out-of-pocket expenses. Their offering also includes supplier invoices and accounting automation.
This is how the work is organized:
- Pay and provide proof.The employee uses his or her company card or records an expense that he or she paid personally. The receipt is associated with the expense in the application.
- Review spending with its limits.Finance configures limits, review thresholds, and approvals. Refunds follow company policy.
- Refund and go to accounting.The computer manages the return of money to the employee and sends the expense data to the connected accounting system.
Pleo also processes invoices and integrates information with accounting. Calitem focuses on accounts payable work that requires checking purchasing documents, posting each line, and applying approvals before generating the entry.
When Pleo fits
- Purchases distributed among employees.You want to provide their own means of payment to those who buy for the company.
- Paid out-of-pocket expenses.You need a circuit to review and return money to employees.
- Spending policies from the beginning.You seek to establish limits and review paths around each purchase.
What is Calitem?
Calitem is the AI accounting system that automates accounts payable, from receiving documents to posting journal entries in your ERP.
It is designed for companies where each invoice can require several checks: finding the purchase order, checking what was received, allocating the expense and obtaining the right approval. Calitem connects this work with your accounting rules and business systems.
Where Pleo has the advantage
Company cards for each employee
Pleo combines company cards and receipt capture in your application. It fits when you want employees to be able to make work purchases without depending on a shared card and for finance to see each expense later.
Refunds within the same tool
Employees record expenses paid with their own money and the team can review them and process the refund. Pleo allows you to manage refunds from administration, with information on the amounts pending to be returned.
Mileage linked to trips
The employee indicates the start and end of the trip to record the mileage. It is useful when an important part of the work consists of settling journeys and travel expenses, in addition to keeping their receipts.
Limits and approvals around spending
Pleo allows you to configure custom limits and multi-step approval processes. This combination serves to organize who can spend and when a person in charge must intervene, together with the data of the purchases made.
Where Calitem has the advantage
Documents from your team channels
Calitem receives invoices and documents from email, WhatsApp, Teams and shared repositories. A person in a store or warehouse can send a photo without installing another app. The documentation enters the same accounting process, although it arrives through different channels.
Extraction tailored to your documents
The AI extracts general data, lines and specific fields of your operation. Calitem processes up to 250 documents every five minutes, to absorb large volumes without transcribing invoices one by one. Fields with low confidence are reviewed.
Duplicate invoices under control
Calitem detects duplicate documents automatically. When the same invoice arrives through different channels, your team can identify repetition before it turns into more accounting work.
Matching invoices, purchase orders and delivery notes
Calitem matches the three documents line by line and checks references, quantities, prices and taxes. If more units are invoiced than received, or a price changes, it flags the difference for your team to review before posting.
Accounts and cost centers by line
One invoice can include expenses from several stores, departments or projects. Calitem assigns categories, subaccounts and cost centres to each line using your chart of accounts and the team’s previous classifications.
Approvals that follow your rules
Define who must approve based on the amount, legal entity, cost centre or supplier. Calitem routes each document through the appropriate workflow and can automatically approve transactions that meet your limits.
AI-generated accounting entries
Calitem uses your chart of accounts and previous accounting decisions to generate journal entries and send them to your ERP. Allocations are included, so the team does not have to re-enter information that has already been processed.
Integrations that connect the entire operation
Calitem connects the ERP to stock systems, POS and internal tools using native integrations and an open API. Specific connections adapt to the flow and data your operation needs, to reduce manual transfers between systems.
Several companies, well-organized accounting
Calitem supports multiple legal entities and cost centres. Classifications and approval routes follow your operational structure, whether you are a group of companies or an accounting firm managing clients’ accounts.
Analysis of accounting information
Calitem allows you to analyze the accounting and accounts payable information it processes. Your team can use that data to track the operation and understand expenses, as well as complete the work on each invoice.
Learn more: Document receptionInvoice, purchase order and delivery note matchingApproval workflowsAutomated accounting
Choose Pleo if…
- You want to give company cards to employees who make purchases.
- You need to centralize out-of-pocket expenses and reimbursements.
- Mileage and commuting create frequent administrative work.
- You look for spending controls associated with cards and team purchases.
Choose Calitem if…
- You manage a high volume of invoices or processes that require several checks before posting.
- You need to cross invoices, orders and delivery notes by line and detect differences in quantities or prices.
- You distribute the expense of the same invoice between different accounts and cost centers.
- You want to configure approvals by company code, cost center, amount, or supplier.
- You are looking to automate the generation of entries with your chart of accounts and previous classifications.
- You need to connect the ERP with stock systems, POS or other tools in your operation.
Frequently asked questions about Pleo and Calitem
When to choose Pleo and when to choose Calitem?
Pleo fits the bill when you need cards, reimbursements, and employee spending tracking, plus invoice features. Calitem fits when your priority is to process accounts payable with high volume or complex rules: reconciliation with orders and delivery notes, allocations by line, approvals and entry in the ERP. The decision depends on the work you want to automate.
What programs does Calitem integrate with?
Calitem integrates with most ERP available on the market, such as A3, Sage, SAP, NetSuite, QuickBooks, Holded and more than 20 others. Available dimensions vary by connector: channels in a3innuva, projects in Sage, and tags in Holded.
How does Calitem manage cost centers?
Calitem uses projects, channels or other dimensions depending on your accounting software. It can assign them automatically using addresses, descriptions, suppliers or products.
How does Calitem match invoices, delivery notes and purchase orders?
Calitem’s document management system matches invoices, purchase orders and delivery notes and compares their products. It checks references, quantities, prices and taxes line by line and flags differences for review.
How does duplicate detection work in Calitem?
Calitem identifies duplicates based on the digital ID of each document and crossing data such as amounts, document number and supplier to flag duplicates to the user.
How does the workflow builder in Calitem work?
In Calitem you can configure routes by company code, cost center, amount or supplier, with automatic approval for operations that comply with your rules.