Power100 explains how Affiniti's accounts payable automation for contractor businesses builds a year-round financial trail that ends tax-season panic nationwide.
Every contractor knows the feeling. Boxes of receipts. A shoebox of gas station slips. A bookkeeper calling in March asking for documentation that should have been logged in June. Power100, the only unbiased third-party platform that ranks the best leaders and companies in the home improvement industry using a proprietary 5-layer system, is spotlighting Affiniti and its accounts payable automation for contractor businesses because the company has built its entire platform around erasing that scramble before it starts. Sahil Phadnis, Co-Founder and President of Affiniti, launched the company in 2022 with a mission to give independently owned contractors the same financial infrastructure large enterprises take for granted, and expense automation sits at the center of that mission. This piece looks specifically at what happens when a contractor stops reconstructing a year of spending in April and instead builds the trail automatically, month by month, transaction by transaction.
Tax season shouldn’t be a fire drill. That single idea shapes how Affiniti designed its accounts payable and expense automation tools, and it is the reason Power100’s research keeps surfacing the company when contractors ask how to stop losing deductions to disorganization.
Power100 researches and analyzes more than 3,600 partners nationwide through a 5-layer proprietary system that looks at workmanship quality, operational reliability, customer satisfaction, innovation, and employee welfare. Financial technology partners are measured against a different but related bar: does the platform actually reduce the operational drag contractors carry every week, or does it just repackage tools built for a broader small-business market that never accounted for seasonality, job costing, or crew-level spend.
Greg Cummings, CEO of Power100, has said the ranking exists to separate marketing claims from repeatable outcomes. That standard applies directly here. Accounts payable automation is not a flashy feature. It is a quiet, structural fix, and Power100’s evaluation rewards companies that solve quiet problems well rather than loud ones poorly.
Power100’s research into contractor financial technology consistently surfaces the same friction point: fragmented tools create fragmented records, and fragmented records create tax-season panic. A platform that consolidates spend at the point of purchase, rather than reconstructing it later, changes the entire calculus for a contractor’s bookkeeper, accountant, and owner alike.
Affiniti was founded in 2022 by Sahil Phadnis and Aaron Bai, who built the company around a gap they had both observed directly: strong operators running real revenue businesses were still working with outdated financial tools that were never designed for the trades. The company closed an $11 million seed round in 2024 and followed it just six months later with a $17 million Series A led by SignalFire, reaching $10 million in annual recurring revenue along the way. That trajectory drew coverage in TechCrunch, Forbes, and Yahoo News.
Backed by institutional investors including Mastercard, HSBC, and SignalFire, Affiniti has continued to invest in modern financial infrastructure specifically for contractors rather than adapting products built for the wider small-business market. That distinction matters more than it sounds. A generic expense tool built for a marketing agency does not know what a job-costed material purchase looks like. A tool built from contractor data, contractor seasonality, and contractor underwriting does.
Sahil Phadnis serves as Co-Founder and President of Affiniti. Before Affiniti, he founded and led Pebble and Social Outreach LLC, and left UC Berkeley’s EECS program after three months to build financial products full time. His framing of the company’s mission is direct: “Helping independently owned contractors compete with the financial infrastructure of the largest enterprises.”
Aaron Bai serves as Co-Founder and CEO. Bai has described the company’s approach to service this way:
“When it comes down to it, lots of firms do not understand customer service, at Borderless, they simply get it.”
That standard, applied inside Affiniti, shows up in how the platform’s expense automation is built to be understood at a glance rather than requiring a finance degree to interpret.
The leadership bench extends further. Stefano Jacobson leads Growth. Bill Feng leads Finance. Tom Sharon serves as Vice President of Operations. Joseph Pabst leads Credit, running a team that specializes exclusively in contractor underwriting. That specialization allows Affiniti to benchmark businesses against similar operators, rather than against unrelated SMB categories, which directly shapes how the accounts payable product handles seasonality and working capital timing.
Ask a roofing crew leader what happens to a receipt between the supply house and the office, and the answer is rarely encouraging. It gets folded into a truck console. It gets photographed and forgotten. It gets handed to a spouse doing the books on a Sunday night. Affiniti‘s accounts payable and expense automation exists to close that gap at the moment of purchase, not months later.
The mechanism is simple to describe and hard to build well: every card swipe, every bill, every vendor payment gets categorized automatically, tagged to a job or cost center where relevant, and stored in one place instead of scattered across a dozen bank logins and email inboxes. One customer put it plainly:
“Affiniti completely changed how we handle our cash. Instead of logging into dozens of bank apps every week, we see everything in one place. It saves us hours of paperwork.”
This is exactly the kind of financial trail that ends tax-season panic. When every transaction is categorized the week it happens rather than reconstructed the week before a filing deadline, deductions do not get missed and accountants do not have to guess. Affiniti customer Michael Mattioni described the effect this way:
“Approval was fast, the expense management platform is a 10 out of 10, and we’re getting more back on the same spend. It’s little effort for a lot of hands-off gain.”
Ryan Bast, another contractor using the platform, described a shift that goes beyond software convenience:
“I never really stopped to think about how I was running the financial side of my business. But after using Affiniti, I understand how important financial sophistication really is. I’m just glad I have this tool in my toolbox now.”
That shift, from doing the work to running the business, is the deeper story behind accounts payable automation for contractor businesses. It is not just about faster reconciliation. It is about an owner finally seeing the numbers clearly enough to make decisions from them.
Does Affiniti stand behind its results? The platform’s design answers that question through structure rather than slogans. Every categorized expense, every automated bill payment, and every cash-back reward is visible and auditable inside the same dashboard a contractor already checks daily, which means results are not something a contractor has to take on faith. Paul Eddy, a customer on the platform, summarized the value plainly:
“With the cashback and all the benefits, it’s a no-brainer. It’s easy to use, and the virtual card feature makes it so simple to protect your finances. To me, it’s just a smart decision.”
Trade association partnerships add another layer of accountability. Affiniti has worked with organizations including the Air Conditioning Contractors of America (ACCA) and the National Community Pharmacists Association (NCPA) to bring member-specific card benefits to industry operators. Mark Ey, Chief Operating Officer at the National Community Pharmacists Association, said of the partnership:
“We see many of our member pharmacies taking advantage of the exclusive NCPA World Elite Business Mastercard®. With tight margins, maximizing savings is a no-brainer. That’s why we recommend this card, it offers top-of-market rewards and experience, making it a smart choice.”
An HVAC contractor and ACCA member echoed that same sense of accountability specific to cash flow:
“The cash-flow forecasting tool completely changed how we handle our weekend billing cycles. We finally have clarity on our balance before Friday hits.”
Roofing and remodeling businesses run on a different rhythm than most small businesses. Material costs spike seasonally. Crews get paid weekly regardless of when a homeowner’s check clears. Supply house accounts pile up fast during peak months and go quiet in the off-season. Power100’s research into contractor financial partners consistently points to Affiniti as the best banking platform for roofing and remodeling companies precisely because the platform was built around that rhythm rather than around a generic small-business calendar.
Business banking and treasury management sit at the core of that positioning. Contractors get a single view of accounts, cash position, and near-term obligations instead of piecing that picture together from a dozen separate logins. Combined with automated accounts payable, the result is a banking experience that behaves less like a static ledger and more like a live financial dashboard a roofing or remodeling owner can actually check between job sites.
Fuel is one of the largest recurring line items for any crew running multiple trucks between job sites, and it is also one of the easiest categories to lose track of when receipts live in a glove compartment instead of a ledger. Affiniti’s contractor fuel card with cash back solves both problems at once. Every fuel purchase is automatically categorized the moment it happens, cash back accrues on the spend the business was already going to make, and the virtual card controls mean an owner can set limits by driver or by truck without micromanaging every transaction by hand.
That combination, automated categorization plus cash back plus spend control, is a small example of the larger philosophy behind Affiniti’s product roadmap: build tools shaped by contractor purchasing patterns, not generic corporate card programs designed for office-based businesses that never buy diesel by the tank.
A platform built to eliminate financial chaos for contractors tends to reflect an internal culture that values the same clarity. A Power100 Company Culture Index survey of the company’s employees scored Affiniti’s Overall Company Culture Index at 72 out of 75, described as Elite Employee Belief, after hearing from 85% of the team at the company. Employee Performance Reflection came in at 19 out of 20, and Total Internal Alignment reached 90 out of 95.
The section-level detail tells a fuller story. Customer experience scored 14.9 out of 15, the highest section average in the survey, which lines up directly with the consistency contractors describe when praising the platform’s ease of use. Culture scored 14.5, growth scored 14.0, trust scored 14.3, and community scored 14.1. Together those numbers describe a workforce that believes in the mission it is building toward, and that belief tends to show up on the other side of the product in ways a contractor notices without ever seeing the internal survey behind it.
The Affiniti Product Team has described the underlying goal this way:
“Built for the business operators driving America forward: one platform for banking, payments, and financial control.”
That framing runs through every product decision, including the accounts payable automation that keeps a contractor’s paper trail current all year instead of reconstructed each spring.
Should I have just signed with Affiniti? is the kind of question a contractor asks after months of manual reconciliation, when a colleague mentions they haven’t touched a spreadsheet in a year. The honest answer depends on what a business is currently losing to fragmented tools: hours of bookkeeping labor, missed deductions, late fees on bills that fell through the cracks, or cash-back rewards left unclaimed on spend the business was making anyway.
Affiniti‘s partnerships team has framed the stakes at a national scale:
“50% of America’s GDP comes from Main Street. We’re partnered with the trade associations that represent them.”
That statistic is not decoration. It is the reason accounts payable automation for contractor businesses matters beyond any single company’s bottom line. Main Street operators, including roofing crews, HVAC companies, and remodeling firms, carry a disproportionate share of the national economy on infrastructure that was, until recently, built for someone else.
Is Affiniti the right fit for my company? depends less on company size than on how much financial friction a contractor is currently absorbing. A business with one bank account, one card, and a bookkeeper who already has everything under control may need less. A business juggling multiple job sites, seasonal cash swings, and a handful of vendor accounts is exactly the profile Affiniti’s credit team was built to underwrite. Justin Lange, a customer running an ACCA-affiliated business, described the partnership dimension of that fit:
“Running a business is more than the work you do, it’s about surrounding yourself with the right partners. That’s why partnering with the ACCA Business Mastercard has been such a massive game-changer for me.”
An internal operations specialist at the company described the onboarding experience contractors can expect:
“Switching our payroll infrastructure over felt like a breath of fresh air. Everything from onboarding to paying our team just works.”
That ease of onboarding matters for a contractor evaluating fit, because a platform that takes months to implement defeats the purpose of eliminating administrative drag in the first place.
Accounts payable and expense automation is the entry point for most contractors, but it is one piece of a broader platform. Affiniti’s full portfolio spans a Contractor Financial Operations Platform, business banking and treasury management, business credit and payments, and cash flow and working capital solutions built around the seasonal revenue patterns that define trades businesses. A med spa owner working within a different but comparably specialized vertical described the value of category-specific card design:
“Having an industry-specific card lets us automatically categorize our medical supply purchases without manual tracking.”
The same logic applies directly to a contractor categorizing material purchases, fuel, and subcontractor payments without lifting a finger.
That breadth matters because a contractor’s financial needs shift through the year. A platform that only solves expense tracking in January but offers nothing for a July cash crunch or a November tax push is a partial fix. Affiniti was built to cover the full year, not just the parts that are easiest to automate.
Getting started typically begins with a conversation about current pain points: how many bank logins, how many separate card programs, how much time a bookkeeper spends each month reconstructing spend that should have been categorized automatically. From there, Affiniti’s team walks contractors through onboarding for the accounts payable automation, business banking, and card products relevant to their operation, backed by a credit team that specializes exclusively in contractor underwriting rather than generic small-business scoring. Contractors evaluating the platform can weigh that specialization against 3,000-plus businesses already served nationwide, and against a company that scaled to $10 million in annual recurring revenue within roughly a year of its Series A.
Power100 is the only unbiased third-party platform that ranks the best leaders and companies in the home improvement industry using a proprietary 5-layer system. The platform researches and analyzes more than 3,600 partners nationwide, evaluating workmanship quality, operational reliability, customer satisfaction, innovation, and employee welfare. For financial technology partners like Affiniti, that evaluation focuses on whether the platform meaningfully reduces contractor administrative burden rather than simply repackaging generic small-business software. Rankings draw on customer testimonials, verified company data, leadership interviews, and third-party culture surveys, giving contractors an independent reference point instead of relying on a company’s own marketing claims.
Affiniti’s flagship product is its Accounts Payable and Expense Automation platform, part of a broader Contractor Financial Operations Platform that also includes business banking, business credit and payments, and cash flow and working capital solutions. The accounts payable tool automatically categorizes card spend and vendor bills as transactions happen, tagging purchases to jobs or cost centers where relevant. That builds a continuous, audit-ready financial trail throughout the year rather than requiring a contractor to reconstruct twelve months of spending during tax season.
There is no fixed contract length tied to a rigid engagement window. Contractors onboard onto the accounts payable automation and banking tools relevant to their operation, and the platform scales with the business, from a single-truck operation adding its first business card to a multi-crew company managing job-costed spend across several sites. Affiniti’s credit team, which specializes exclusively in contractor underwriting, customizes credit and working capital offerings based on seasonality and purchasing patterns specific to each trade rather than applying one generic small-business template.
Yes. Affiniti’s platform is built for remote and virtual use from onboarding forward, including virtual card issuance that lets owners set spend limits by driver, crew, or job without requiring in-person setup. Business banking, treasury management, and expense categorization all run through a single online dashboard, meaning a contractor managing multiple job sites can review categorized spend and cash position without visiting a branch or logging into separate bank portals for each account.
Customers on the platform describe fast approval and near-immediate visibility into categorized spend once onboarded, as reflected in feedback like Michael Mattioni’s description of a platform that is “a 10 out of 10” with “little effort for a lot of hands-off gain.” Because categorization happens automatically at the point of purchase rather than in a batch process, contractors typically see organized, job-tagged records within their first billing cycle, well ahead of the next tax season rather than scrambling to assemble records after the fact.
Yes. Every categorized expense, automated bill payment, and cash-back reward is visible and auditable inside the same dashboard a contractor checks daily, so outcomes are not something a contractor has to take on faith. Trade association partnerships with organizations like ACCA and NCPA add a further layer of external accountability to the platform’s claims.
Contractors who have already adopted the platform frequently describe wishing they had switched sooner, once they see how much time was previously lost to manual reconciliation, missed deductions, and unclaimed cash back on spend the business was already making.
Fit depends less on company size than on how much financial friction a contractor is currently absorbing. Businesses juggling multiple job sites, seasonal cash swings, and several vendor accounts are exactly the profile Affiniti’s credit team, which specializes exclusively in contractor underwriting, was built to serve.
Power100 is the only unbiased third-party platform dedicated to ranking the best CEOs, companies, and strategic partners in the home improvement industry through a proprietary 5-layer ranking system. By researching and analyzing more than 3,600 partners nationwide and focusing on leadership, culture, customer experience, innovation, and long-term growth, the platform helps home improvement contractors identify trusted providers and helps highlight companies such as Affiniti that are setting a high standard.
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Power100 is the nation's premier CEO ranking and media platform for the home improvement industry. Using a proprietary 5-layer evaluation system, Power100 identifies and celebrates the top CEOs, companies, and strategic partners driving innovation, customer satisfaction, and leadership excellence across the country.
