Lovet automates team spend and cuts finance admin in half with Airwallex

Introducing Lovet

Lovet started in a spare bedroom, built by ‌husband-and-wife duo Germaine Foo and Lee Wei Leong. They packed orders by hand while holding day jobs, growing a blogshop into one of Singapore’s most beloved womenswear labels. 

From day one, their mission was simple: to make fashion joyful and accessible, while taking care of the people behind the brand. 

But staying true to that mission takes grit. Scaling in Singapore means rising costs, tight margins, and the need for financial agility. Without VC backing, the team must watch cash flow closely and make every operational decision count, especially as more people rely on them to be paid on time.

As Lovet sets its sights on regional expansion, its payroll, reimbursements, and reconciliation processes need to be faster, more reliable, and ready to grow with the business.

The challenge

Complex payroll for a growing team

As Lovet grew, so did the team behind the scenes. During normal months, they work with 50 to 70 part-time staff; during peak periods like Christmas and Lunar New Year, that number jumps to over 200.

With headcount fluctuating so frequently, payroll became a constant challenge. Tracking varying hours, shifts, and payouts for a workforce that doubled or tripled in size during busy periods demanded more time and a higher level of accuracy than its existing tools could handle. What had worked for a small team no longer scaled with its seasonal growth.

Payroll ran across two separate platforms. Hours clocked were tracked in one, but payments had to be processed in another. Each cycle meant exporting spreadsheets, manually verifying hours, uploading files, and running payouts one by one. For finance, it meant long hours, missed payments, and too much room for human error.

Lee Wei Leong

Co-founder and COO of Lovet

“Before Airwallex, we were juggling two systems to manage payroll, and it just wasn’t efficient. With part-timers working different hours every week, we had to track schedules manually, export the data, and process each payment one by one.”

Slow and tedious reimbursement processes

Reimbursements were handled through a workflow that was equally fragmented. Staff often had to pay out of pocket, submit receipts and claims through one platform, while approvals and payouts were handled in separate systems. With transactions scattered across multiple platforms, finance had limited visibility into what had been submitted, approved, or paid. Payouts were usually processed only once a month, leaving staff waiting weeks to be reimbursed and finance teams buried in admin. 

Their previous payout provider didn’t integrate with Xero, so reconciliation had to be done manually. “Sometimes receipts went missing or couldn’t be traced, which meant some claims couldn’t be expensed properly,” says Wei Leong.

Lovet was managing its financial operations the way many businesses still do – stitching together disjointed systems and hoping the seams would hold. But with expansion plans on the horizon, it was clear Lovet needed a better way.

The solution

One connected platform for payroll, claims, and bills

Lovet brought payroll, reimbursements, and supplier payments together in Airwallex. Now the finance team manages everything through an integrated, automated workflow.

Airwallex connects directly with leading HR tools like Employment Hero and accounting software such as Xero, so data moves instantly between systems.

With the HRIS integration, timesheets from Employment Hero will be synced automatically to Airwallex, so the finance team can review and pay everyone in a single batch. From there, they can also upload, approve, and reconcile everything – from invoices and bills to reimbursements – in one place. All activity in Airwallex syncs automatically with Xero, giving the finance team real-time visibility and complete audit trails at every step.

For day-to-day business expenses, Lovet’s employees can either use Airwallex Corporate Cards for larger purchases or submit receipts for smaller claims directly through the platform. Receipts are uploaded via the app where Airwallex’s AI-powered OCR extracts all the key details, so there’s no need for manual entry or back-and-forth approvals. Once a claim is approved, reimbursements typically land in employees’ local bank accounts within 24 hours, thanks to Airwallex’s high-speed transfer rails.

Behind the scenes, things run a lot more smoothly. By unifying these processes into one connected platform, Lovet eliminated manual uploads, double-handling, and the need to toggle between different systems. Month-end closing is simpler, and the team now processes payroll and reimbursements at record speed. While error rates remain consistently low, the real gain is how much faster and more confidently Lovet can run its finances.

Lee Wei Leong

Co-founder and COO of Lovet

“Payroll is easier to manage, and it’s all linked to our HR software. Reimbursements are faster, and finance doesn’t need to chase receipts or do year-end reconciliations manually anymore. We’re saving time across the board. That gives us more capacity to focus on bigger things.”

The result

Airwallex Spend gives Lovet the visibility and control over cash flow that every growing business needs to thrive. The team no longer worries about funds getting stuck in slow manual processes. Instead, liquidity is visible and accessible, which gives Lovet the confidence to plan for growth, respond to rising costs, and support its expansion into Malaysia.

With Airwallex, Lovet turned financial operations from a manual drain into a growth advantage, delivering results like these:

• 150+ hours saved each year on salary payments: Payroll now runs ‌faster with Airwallex Batch Transfers. Even during peak seasons, salaries are paid on time for 200+ employees.

• Daily, not monthly, reimbursements: Airwallex Corporate Cards and high-speed local transfers mean staff are never out of pocket. Claims that once took weeks to approve and process are now paid into employee accounts within one working day.

• 50% faster financial close and real-time spend visibility with Xero integration: Automated reconciliation and audit trails help the team close the books faster and with fewer errors, even as the business scales.

• One unified platform to manage all spend: Lovet replaced a disjointed stack of tools with a single integrated system. Now, every card, claim, and payment runs through one dashboard, giving the team a complete, real-time view of spend across the business.

Lovet is now piloting deeper HRIS integrations to reduce payroll admin costs even further. They’re also exploring Airwallex Yield* to put surplus balances to work and help offset the impact of rising operating costs.

For Wei Leong, adopting the new technology was an easy decision. “I’ve always believed that if a product makes daily work easier, it’s worth adopting. Once the team saw how much time they were saving, there were no complaints. My advice? Don’t be afraid to try new things – you’ve got nothing to lose.”

With Airwallex, Lovet can continue adapting, stay in control of costs, and build a business that’s ready for the next challenge.

*Airwallex Capital Hong Kong Limited (CE Number: BUL570) (Airwallex Capital) is regulated by the Securities & Futures Commission of Hong Kong (SFC) to provide asset management services. Yield is a low risk-rated discretionary portfolio management service provided by Airwallex Capital Hong Kong Limited. It is not a savings or deposit product. Investments involve risks and Yield does not provide any guarantee or assurance of returns