AP automation for small business, without the enterprise implementation
The free plan processes 25 invoices a month with unlimited users, takes no credit card and does not expire. You get your own intake address at the end of setup.
Free
$0
25 invoices / month
Starter
$39
150 invoices / month
Growth
$99
500 invoices / month
Pro
$249
1,500 invoices / month
- Unlimited users on every plan
- Free every month, not a trial
Why small teams stay manual longer than they should
The obstacle is rarely the software’s capability. It is the shape of the purchase around it.
The purchase is built for someone else
Enterprise platforms require a demo before they quote, an implementation measured in weeks, and an annual commitment. That suits a procurement department. It does not suit a controller who also does payroll.
So staying manual is rational
The evaluation costs more attention than the software saves, and picking wrong means a year-long contract. By the time volume settles it, the process has calcified around a shared mailbox and a spreadsheet.
The fix is a different purchase
A free tier you can run real invoices through, published prices, no implementation project, and monthly billing you can leave. That is why a small management company can adopt inletAP when it could not adopt AvidXchange or Stampli.
The trade, stated plainly
inletAP has no payment rails, no check against goods received, and no decade of enterprise deployment. If you need those, buy the enterprise product. If you want invoices to stop being typed in by hand, this is built for you.
Capabilities
What makes it adoptable by a small team
A free plan, not a trial
25 processed invoices a month, unlimited users, one intake mailbox, the QuickBooks Online and Xero connectors and CSV export. No credit card and no expiry. It is a hard cap, so it cannot generate a bill you did not expect.
Published prices
$39, $99 and $249 a month for 150, 500 and 1,500 invoices. Overage from $0.35 down to $0.18 an invoice. Annual billing is two months free — ten months instead of twelve.
No implementation project
Signing up creates the workspace and issues the first intake mailbox in the same session. Vendor mappings and approval tiers are added as you go, not configured before you start.
Useful on day one
CSV export is on every plan including free, so inletAP is producing something your ledger can consume before you have connected anything.
Everyone can have a login
Unlimited users on every plan, including free. Invite every approver, every property manager and your outside bookkeeper — the price is per invoice document, so headcount never changes the bill.
Controls a small team can actually run
Separation of duties as a setting an admin turns on, so whoever edited an invoice cannot approve it. Approval thresholds by amount, duplicate and price checks on every bill, and an append-only audit log.
Why this one
The checklist worth applying to any AP tool you evaluate
- Can you see the price without booking a call?
- Can you run your own invoices through it before paying?
- Is there an implementation fee or a professional services requirement?
- Is there an annual minimum, or can you leave monthly?
- How long from signing up to processing a real invoice?
- Does it understand the coding dimensions your business actually uses?
- What happens to your documents if you stop paying?
Compare
Where inletAP sits against the alternatives
| inletAP | Enterprise AP (AvidXchange, Nexus) | Horizontal AP (Bill, Stampli, Ramp) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Published pricing | Yes, with a free tier | No — demo required | Usually yes |
| Self-serve signup | Yes | No | Usually |
| Implementation project | None | Weeks to months | Days |
| Property / unit / entity coding | First-class | First-class | Generic dimensions |
| Per-property intake addresses | Yes | Varies | No |
| Payment rails | None | Included | Included |
| Purchase order matching | 2-way, with balance tracking | Yes | Varies |
| Check against goods received | No | Yes | Varies |
| Best fit | Small–mid property management | Large portfolios with procurement | General SMB finance |
Compiled from these vendors' public positioning in 2026. If payment rails or a check against goods received are requirements, inletAP is not the right product for you — and it is cheaper for both of us if you find that out here. Side by side with one vendor: Bill.com and AvidXchange.
Pricing
Start at nothing, and only move when volume says to
Free for 25 invoices a month, with the QuickBooks Online and Xero connectors included. $39 at 150, which is where the rules engine and approval tiers switch on. $99 at 500.
Unlimited users throughout. Monthly billing, no minimum, cancel whenever.
Prices are in US dollars and exclude sales tax, which is added where it applies.
Paid plans renew automatically at the price shown — every month, or every 12 months on annual billing — until you cancel. Cancel any time in billing settings: the next renewal stops and you keep the period you have already paid for.
Small business AP — common questions
What is the cheapest way to automate accounts payable for a small business?
Do I need a demo call to get pricing?
Is there a minimum contract or an implementation fee?
How many people do I need to run this?
We only process about 60 invoices a month. Is that too few to bother?
How is this different from Bill.com, Stampli or Ramp?
Run a month of invoices through it for nothing
25 processed invoices, unlimited users, no credit card, no expiry. That is enough to know whether the extraction holds up on your vendors and whether the math works on your volume.