The complete finance stack procurement checklist

Key takeaways

• Your procurement decisions today should account for your business’ future growth, as you expand into new markets and add new currencies or entities.

• Most platforms excel at their core function but can’t provide unified data across accounts, payments, FX, and spend.

• Airwallex gives you global infrastructure and software in one platform, so your finance stack scales without having to rebuild it every time your business needs change.

The finance stack you choose today will either scale with your business growth or become the ceiling that stops it. It’s easy to focus on today’s problems when designing your procurement process, but between signing the contract and going live, you might've added three more markets and two new currencies. Suddenly, that perfect-fit platform feels a bit inadequate.

The options feel endless: banking services, payment acceptance, spend management, FX platforms, reconciliation tools. When these functions work together on one platform, your finance team can close the books in days instead of weeks, add new markets through configuration instead of custom integration, and see complete financial operations from a single dashboard.

This guide helps you decide exactly what you need in your fintech stack and holistically examine vendors.

1. Define your needs before you shortlist vendors

Start by getting clear on the workflows you're running today and where they might break tomorrow.

✅ Map the workflows you can't afford to break. At a most basic level, your team needs to get paid, pay suppliers, approve expenses, see where cash sits across entities, and close the books without losing a weekend.

✅ Separate what needs to work globally from day one and what can wait. Be honest about which currencies, countries, entities, and payment methods you need now versus what you'll add as you grow.

✅ Set your non-negotiables for governance upfront. Who needs access to what? How do approval policies scale when you go from three signatories to 30? What audit trails do you need when investors start asking questions during due diligence?

✅ Prioritise real-time visibility. You need dashboards that show cash positions, spending patterns, and transaction statuses as they happen. Real-time data lets you spot trends, catch fraud, and respond to market changes before they show up in your P&L.

2. Stress-test global reach and infrastructure

Every vendor claims they're global, but make sure you ask for specifics to prove their credentials.

✅ Verify local capabilities. Check whether the platform offers multi-currency accounts that let you hold funds in the currencies you need without having to open local bank accounts in each market. For payment acceptance, confirm your payment provider supports the methods your customers use, such as Alipay and WeChat Pay in Asia. And ask whether they route transfers through faster and often-free local rails instead of SWIFT.

✅ Look for a single provider that can offer more. Seek a partner that can support your end-to-end financial operations. For example, some may offer multi-currency accounts as well as FX and transfers, payment acceptance, cards, and expense management all on one platform. This saves you from juggling multiple providers and reconciling data across all of them.

✅ Pressure-test FX and treasury realities. Where do conversions actually happen? How are rates calculated? Can you hold funds in the currency you received them in, or does every transaction force a 2–3% conversion? Look for a platform that lets you hold multiple currencies and convert them at interbank rates at your choosing.

3. Evaluate integration and scalability

Your finance stack needs to talk to the systems you already run, and grow with your business rather than just serve its needs today.

✅ Start with your system of record and map outwards. Your ERP or accounting software sits at the centre. Check whether integrations work with Xero, NetSuite, or QuickBooks and whether reports match how you run the business. Then extend the map to billing, payroll, HRIS, BI, and procurement to pinpoint where data breaks or needs manual handoffs.

✅ Inspect API quality like a product. Review the documentation, check whether webhooks exist for real-time updates, understand how permissions work, confirm there's a sandbox for testing, and ask about versioning. Strong API quality saves your engineering team from building custom workarounds.

✅ Model for increased complexity and volume. Your transaction count might double, while your approval paths, reconciliation lines, and entity structures could multiply by 10. Test whether the platform handles more currencies and workflows without forcing you to rebuild from scratch.

4. Assess AI readiness through unified data and controls

AI only delivers value when it can see the full picture. If your finance stack relies on multiple providers, your software and infrastructure are likely disconnected, which means even the smartest AI can't understand the context behind each transaction.

✅ Identify where AI will actually sit. Reconciliation, anomaly detection, routing optimisation, policy enforcement, and treasury decisions all benefit from AI that learns from patterns across your business. Ask vendors to show you which workflows AI already automates, which ones are still manual, and which ones are in the pipeline. The velocity and track record of your provider’s AI development indicates how future-proof and sustainable its technology is.

✅ Check whether data moves end-to-end without breaks. From customer payment to ledger, from card swipe to approval to coding, every transaction should flow through a single platform. At Airwallex, we’ve built our infrastructure and software as one system so AI can see every transaction across accounts, payments, FX, and spend, giving it the visibility needed to deliver real insights. We’re also building AI agents on top of our unified global infrastructure and software that can manage treasury decisions, validate compliance, and optimise payment routing and FX exposure.

✅ Demand explainability and oversight. You need logs, reasons for automated decisions, and the ability to set guardrails by region, entity, or risk level. AI should support your judgement, not replace it. 

5. Validate security, compliance, and operational resilience

Customers judge security by how you handle their data and protect their payments. Here’s what to look out for:

✅ Confirm baseline certifications and controls. SOC 2, ISO 27001, PCI DSS where relevant, plus data residency and encryption standards. Airwallex holds SOC 1 and SOC 2 certifications, PCI DSS Level 1 compliance, and over 60 regulatory licences globally, which means it can operate across markets without forcing you into manual workarounds.

✅ Review risk operations. Ask about fraud tooling, dispute handling, access controls, SSO, role-based permissions, and incident response processes. Platforms with real-time fraud detection can flag suspicious transactions before they impact your balance sheet.

✅ Ask how the platform handles regulatory changes. Licensing maintenance, product updates, and audit support shouldn't fall on your team. Providers with deep regulatory experience adjust to new requirements without forcing you to rebuild your stack.

6. Run a procurement process that delivers concrete answers

Most RFPs collect feature lists that vendors check off without proving they can deliver. You need to define a process that compels vendors to demonstrate how they’ll meet your needs.

✅ Build a scoring matrix that reflects your growth constraints. Time-to-value, total cost, global coverage, integration effort, and governance fit tell you more about long-term success than feature parity. Weight the criteria based on where your business will be in 18 months, not where it sits today.

✅ Use a structured RFP that compares like-for-like. Ask for requirements by market, such as "settlement times for Singapore, UK, and Australia with specific fee breakdowns". Request transparent fee structures that show exactly when costs increase, and implementation timelines with clear responsibilities on both sides. Clear, detailed answers indicate the vendor has experience with similar use cases.

✅ Test a real workflow. Test one market, one complex payment route, one close cycle, and one spend policy rollout. This process will show how the vendor handles edge cases specific to your business.

7. Negotiate beyond price

Price is only one part of the commercial relationship. The SLAs, support structure, and pricing triggers will define whether the platform will be with you for the long term.

✅ Tie commercials to outcomes you can measure. Settlement SLAs, support response times, implementation milestones, and reliability metrics give you recourse when things break. Vendors who commit to measurable outcomes demonstrate confidence in their platform's performance.

✅ Reduce pricing surprises. Define fee categories, FX markups, minimums, tier changes, and what triggers re-pricing. Ask for scenarios that show how costs scale when you add entities, markets, and currencies.

✅ Lock in support expectations. Escalation paths, dedicated account management, and what "24/7 support" actually covers should be documented in the contract. You need to know who picks up the phone when payments start failing at 2am on a Sunday.

8. Calculate the total cost of ownership

Setup fees tell you one story, but the real cost reveals itself over 18 months when transaction volumes climb, new markets get added, and you realise training expenses weren't factored in.

✅ Map all setup and ongoing costs. Initial implementation, data migration, subscription fees, transaction fees, and any charges tied to volume thresholds or user counts. Ask vendors for scenarios that show how costs scale as your business grows.

✅ Account for hidden costs. These could include additional costs for training programmes, advanced technical support, systems maintenance, and engineering resources required to build new integrations.

✅ Evaluate integrated vs standalone solutions. Point solutions may be good for specific functions, which works well if you have one or two specialised needs. But consider whether it’s worth paying for multiple subscriptions, reconciling data across separate dashboards, and troubleshooting multiple systems when issues arise. An integrated solution can mitigate many of these problems before they even occur.

✅ Plan implementation, change management, and support resources. Implementation reveals whether a platform will work the way the demo suggested. Plan for cross-functional coordination, clear deliverables, and honest conversations about who will support the rollout and ongoing maintenance.

✅ Map dependencies and owners. Finance, procurement, IT, security, legal, and ops all have a stake in how your finance stack operates. Identify who owns what early so approval chains don't stall when you need sign-off.

✅ Define onboarding deliverables. These include integrations with your accounting software, permissions structures that match your org chart, policies that reflect how your team works, reporting dashboards that show what you need to see, and training for the people who'll run it daily.

✅ Decide what you'll retire. Legacy bank accounts, payment providers, card programmes, and manual reconciliation processes should all go on the list. Keeping old systems once you’ve successfully migrated your finance operations means you're paying for multiple stacks and reconciling data across both.

10. Maintain the relationship for the long haul

Your finance stack is a relationship that needs structure, visibility, and flexibility as your business changes.

✅ Set governance from day one. Quarterly reviews, roadmap alignment, and coverage expansion planning keep both sides honest about where the platform is heading and whether it still fits your needs. If your provider doesn't proactively share product updates or regional rollouts, you'll miss chances to get more value.

✅ Track the metrics that show stack health. Close time, reconciliation exceptions, failed payments, dispute rates, and FX leakage tell you whether the platform is holding up under real load.

✅ Keep optionality without fragmentation: Document exit paths, data portability, and contingency plans even when things are working. You don't want to discover migration dependencies when you're already under pressure to switch.

Procurement checklist template

Use this template to keep your evaluation focused. Print it, share it with your procurement team, and mark off each item as you work through vendor conversations.

Needs assessment

☐ Map critical workflows (accepting payments, paying suppliers, managing expenses, treasury, close process)

☐ Identify which currencies, countries, and payment methods are needed immediately vs later

☐ Define governance requirements (who needs access, approval policies, audit trails, reporting granularity)

Market scan and shortlist criteria

☐ List platforms with proven global infrastructure (e.g. licences, local rails, multi-currency support)

☐ Confirm each vendor handles your transaction volume across all your markets today

☐ Verify they can scale your current entity count and payment flows

Vendor evaluation scorecard

☐ Build a scoring matrix weighted by growth constraints (time-to-value, cost, coverage, integration, governance)

☐ Score vendors on infrastructure depth (licensing footprint, local payment rails, data integration, API quality, scalability across entities and markets)

☐ Rank platforms based on an 18-month trajectory and not just your current state

RFP questions

☐ Ask for settlement times by specific market with detailed breakdowns

☐ Request transparent fee breakdowns (setup, transactions, FX markups, tier changes)

☐ Confirm API quality (documentation, webhooks, sandbox, versioning)

☐ Verify AI capabilities (which workflows are automated, where data breaks exist)

Proof of concept plan

☐ Design tests covering at least one market, one complex payment route, and one close cycle

☐ Run one spend policy rollout to see how approvals and controls work

☐ Test real workflows that mirror your operations

Security and compliance checks

☐ Confirm SOC 2, ISO 27001, PCI DSS certifications where relevant

☐ Review fraud tooling, dispute handling, access controls, and incident response

☐ Ask how the platform handles regulatory changes and maintains licences

Pricing and contract checklist

☐ Map all costs (setup, migration, subscriptions, transactions, volume thresholds)

☐ Identify hidden costs (training, technical support, maintaining old systems during transition)

☐ Tie commercials to measurable outcomes (settlement SLAs, support response times, reliability metrics)

☐ Document support expectations (escalation paths, account management, what "24/7 support" covers)

Implementation plan

☐ Map dependencies across finance, IT, security, legal, ops

☐ Define onboarding deliverables (integrations, permissions, policies, dashboards, training)

☐ List legacy systems to retire (bank accounts, payment providers, card programmes)

Ongoing governance KPIs

☐ Set a quarterly review cadence with the vendor

☐ Define stack health metrics (close time, reconciliation exceptions, failed payments, dispute rates, FX leakage)

☐ Document exit paths, data portability, and contingency plans

Choose a provider you won't outgrow

The finance stack you choose today shapes how fast you can move tomorrow. Procurement processes focused on current requirements miss the point, as with a bit of luck, your business won't stay still long enough for that features list to stay relevant.

At Airwallex, we’ve spent the last decade building global financial infrastructure (business accounts, FX management, payment acceptance, and cards) and software (workflows, spend management, reconciliation) into one unified platform. This uniquely positions AI to give you the full picture of your global finances as the single source of truth. We're already building AI agents on top of this unified system that can manage treasury decisions, validate compliance, and optimise payment routing and FX exposure.

With Airwallex, you won’t have to open local bank accounts or juggle multiple providers. Our platform lets you:

• Open domestic and foreign currency accounts in 21 countries within minutes

• Transact in 90+ currencies at competitive rates 

• Pay out to 200+ countries

• Accept payments in 180+ countries 

• Issue multi-currency company and employee cards in 60+ markets 

Your finance stack should make growth easier. Not harder, and not more painful every time you add a country or currency.

FAQs

What's the biggest mistake finance teams make during procurement?

They optimise for what they need right now instead of where they're heading. Your business could add markets, currencies, and entities faster than you think, and that platform that fits perfectly today could end up limiting your growth 18 months from now.

How long should procurement take for a finance stack?

For mid-size companies with existing systems, plan for a minimum of 12 to 16 weeks. You need time for a needs assessment, vendor evaluation, proof-of-concept, contract negotiation, and cross-functional sign-off. You also need to account for migration planning from legacy systems, which adds complexity most startups don't face. If you're replacing multiple existing providers, the evaluation process could take longer as you test how well a new platform handles workflows spread across your current stack.

Should we go for best-in-class point solutions or an integrated platform?

Point solutions can excel at specific functions, especially if you have one or two specialised needs. But as you scale across markets and entities, integrated platforms offer clear advantages. You avoid reconciling data across multiple dashboards, reduce coordination overhead between different vendors, and eliminate the complexity of managing multiple contracts and renewals. Integrated platforms also position you better for AI capabilities, as AI needs unified data across accounts, payments, FX, and spend to deliver meaningful insights.

What questions reveal whether a vendor can actually scale with us?

Ask vendors to model their capabilities and costs beyond your current needs. For example, consider asking them to quote for 3x your current transaction volume and 5x your current entity count, with additional currencies and approval workflows. Vendors who can provide clear pricing and confirm the platform handles this growth without major rebuilds demonstrate they've built infrastructure for scale.