Backdrop

Backdrop | Manage expenses for Film, TV, Music & Event Productions is an all-in-one pre-accounting and expense management tool designed for production budgets. It lets you issue and track virtual and physical purchasing cards, streamline receipts, invoices, and approvals, manage purchase orders and petty cash, and synchronize with your bank and accounting systems. Available on web and mobile, Backdrop consolidates card spending, receipts, vendor data, and payments into a single platform to accelerate reconciliation and financial reporting for productions of all sizes.

How Backdrop Works

1. Card issuance & management: Create unlimited p-cards (virtual or physical) for crew, set spend limits per card, and distribute them instantly.
2. Receipt capture & parsing: Snap photos of receipts or upload invoices; AI parses multilingual receipts and vendor invoices to classify expenses and file them automatically.
3. Envelopes, POs & approvals: Create petty cash envelopes, purchase orders (POs), and routes for approvals from anywhere, with custom approval chains and real-time status.
4. Payments & vendor management: Upload invoices, pay vendors or individuals via ACH or check, and onboard vendors with bank details, W-9s, and 1099s without back-and-forth emails.
5. Bank integration & reporting: Connect cards and bank data to match receipts to transactions, view real-time spend, and generate tax/accounting reports in preferred formats.
6. Multi-production support: Switch between productions in one place, keeping each production’s finances separate and auditable.

Backdrop emphasizes speed (fast card issuance, receipt capture), accuracy (AI parsing and PO matching), and cross-platform accessibility to reduce manual data entry and reconciliation time.

Use Cases

• Issue and manage production-wide purchasing cards with enforced limits
• Digitize and reconcile receipts against card transactions and POs
• Manage petty cash and reimbursement workflows
• Approve and schedule payments to vendors and contractors
• Onboard vendors and collect required tax information efficiently
• Consolidate financial reporting for audits and tax compliance

Features

• Instant issuance of virtual and physical p-cards with per-card spend controls
• Real-time receipt parsing and automatic expense filing across languages/currencies
• Petty cash envelopes creation, tracking, and approvals
• Purchase Orders creation, approval, and tracking in web or mobile
• Invoices uploading, vendor onboarding (bank details, W-9s, 1099s) and payment processing via ACH or check
• Custom approval chains and automatic PO matching
• Global vendor management and multi-currency support
• Bank integration for seamless receipt-to-transaction matching
• Real-time spend visibility across productions and departments
• Comprehensive financial reporting compatible with your preferred accounting tools
• Cross-device access (web and mobile) with offline-friendly workflows

Why Choose Backdrop

• Speeds up pre-accounting and reconciliation by centralizing receipts, cards, and payments
• Reduces manual data entry and errors through AI parsing and automated workflows
• Scales across multiple productions with independent budgeting and reporting
• Supports multilingual and multi-currency environments for international productions
• Helps stay on budget with real-time spend insights and alerting

Core Benefits

• Time savings: Significant reductions in manual reconciliation and data entry
• Accuracy: AI parsing and PO matching improve data integrity
• Visibility: Real-time spend across crews and departments
• Compliance: Vendor onboarding and tax form collection streamlined

How to Get Started

• Sign up for a trial or book a demo to see card issuance, receipt capture, and PO workflows in action.
• Connect your bank accounts, invite team members, and configure approval chains tailored to your production workflows.

Note: Backdrop is designed to replace fragmented expense tools with a single, integrated platform for production finance.