Relay Business Banking: Powerful Free Tools, Skip the Upgrade
Relay packs expense tracking, bill pay and invoicing into its free plan. Competitors offer similar tools, but few bundle them all at no cost.
The bottom line:
Relay’s free “Starter” plan is a strong pick for small teams managing multiple budgets. You can open up to 20 checking accounts per business and assign debit cards per account. Cash-heavy businesses and those needing Zelle should look elsewhere.
Bank account details
Monthly fee
$0
APY
N/A
Bonus
N/A
Pros & Cons
Pros
No required monthly fee, minimum opening deposit, excess transaction or overdraft fees.
Supports multiple accounts, debit cards per business.
Access up to $3 million in FDIC insurance with Insured Cash Sweep.
Free incoming wires and low outgoing wire transfer fees.
Built-in invoicing and bill pay.
Cons
No live support on weekends.
Low limit for cash deposits.
Complaints of account freezes, long resolution times.
Does not support Zelle for Business.
Compare to other bank accounts
4.8
NerdWallet rating
NerdWallet's ratings are determined by our editorial team. The scoring formulas take into account multiple data points for each business account, including fees, perks and accessibility.
at Relay, Deposits are FDIC Insured
4.7
NerdWallet rating
NerdWallet's ratings are determined by our editorial team. The scoring formulas take into account multiple data points for each business account, including fees, perks and accessibility.
4.5
NerdWallet rating
NerdWallet's ratings are determined by our editorial team. The scoring formulas take into account multiple data points for each business account, including fees, perks and accessibility.
Monthly fee
$0
Monthly fee
$15.00
Waived with $2,000 minimum balanceMonthly fee
$0
APY
N/A
APY
N/A
APY
N/A
Need more options? Check our picks for best business bank accounts of 2026
A traditional bank is the better bet for businesses that regularly deal with cash. Chase Business Complete Banking® includes up to $5,000 in cash deposits per month (no additional fee), plus unlimited cash deposits at Chase ATMs. You still get great built-in tools, too. This account comes with invoicing and you can accept card payments from the mobile app. Chase also supports Zelle for Business and offers round-the-clock live support. Relay doesn’t offer either of those.
Relay is great for incoming wires. Those are free. But if you send wires on the regular, even its low fees add up. Mercury’s free business checking account gives you free domestic and international U.S. dollar wire transfers (incoming and outgoing). The account also includes invoicing, bill payment and contractor management tools. The main drawback? Mercury doesn’t support cash deposits.
Full review
Toronto-based Relay Financial Technologies launched in 2018 with a free business checking account and a mission to help small-business owners automate their finances. Since then, it’s expanded to include invoicing, savings, lending and credit cards. It’s also moved into “premium” banking, with additional features and automations tucked behind paywalls.
Relay’s free Starter plan does a lot for $0 a month. You can open up to 20 checking accounts, issue debit cards with spending limits and send invoices. Bill pay and expense tracking come built in, and both sync with QuickBooks Online and Xero.
That mix works well for small teams that manage money in separate buckets, such as agencies, contractors, e-commerce sellers and landlords.
Relay’s paid plans don’t add enough value to justify the high monthly cost, though. You get a small discount on outgoing wires, same-day ACH payments and certain payment processing fees. Paid plans also unlock recurring invoicing, custom bookkeeping automations and batch payments. You can see a breakdown of the difference below.
The math changes if you plan to keep a sizable savings balance or leverage Relay’s business credit card. Relay hikes up their APY and cash-back rates, respectively, for paid subscribers. But there are free alternatives to these as well. (See our picks for no-annual-fee business cards and high-yield savings accounts.)
Relay has other trade-offs, even on its free plan. Cash deposits at ATMs are capped at $2,000 per day. Relay doesn’t support Zelle. And customer complaints about account freezes are prevalent enough online that Relay’s CEO wrote a blog post to address the issue.
It’s also worth noting that Relay is a technology company, not a bank. Its banking services are provided by Thread Bank, an FDIC-insured institution. Relay deposit accounts are insured by the FDIC for up to $3 million via Thread’s deposit sweep program.
Relay business banking is best for small-business owners who:
- Need multiple bank accounts for their business.
- Regularly receive wire transfers.
- Want built-in expense management, invoicing tools.
Relay's business account details
Relay Business Checking: Starter | Relay Business Savings: Starter | |
|---|---|---|
Monthly fee: | $0 | $0 |
Minimum opening deposit: | $0 | $0 |
APY: | None. | 1.19% |
Transactions: | No excess transaction fees. | No excess transaction fees. |
Cash deposits: | Allpoint+ ATMs: No fee. Limit $1K/transaction, $2K/day. Green Dot: $4.95 per deposit. Daily and per-transaction limits apply. | No cash deposits. |
Wire transfer fees: | Free incoming wires. Outgoing wires: $8 domestic; $5 international (Local Network), $25 international (SWIFT network). | Free incoming wires. No outgoing wire transfers. |
Bonus: | None. | None. |
Relay has two premium business checking plans — Grow and Scale — that offer discounted payments and additional features. Businesses enrolled in those plans earn a higher APY on any associated Relay business savings accounts.
Relay Grow ($30/mo):
- Discounted wires and same-day ACH payments.
- Includes recurring invoices, batch vendor payments and spend approval requests.
- Business savings earns 1.87% APY.
Relay Scale ($90/mo):
- Free same-day ACH transfers.
- Business savings earns 3.21% APY.
For business checking, we rate the entry-level account. That’s Relay’s Starter plan. This allows us to fairly compare accounts, apples-to-apples. We don’t currently rate Relay’s business savings account because it’s not a standalone product. You cannot open it without also having Relay business checking.
Where Relay business accounts stand out
Multiple accounts and team cards
Relay makes it easy to give each part of your business its own pot of money. You can open up to 20 checking accounts (10 for sole proprietors) and issue up to 50 debit cards per account. Use them to designate and manage funds for taxes, payroll, ad spend and client projects.
Landlords and short-term rental hosts can keep a separate account for each property. E-commerce sellers can give each sales channel its own account, plus accounts for inventory and ad spend. That shows which channel pays for itself.
As your team grows, you can invite members, assign roles and permissions, and set spending limits on each card. Employees can then make purchases without full access to your accounts.
Our editorial team surveyed other banks and fintechs to see how their entry-level accounts compare on subaccounts, virtual cards and other features. Bluevine’s allows five subaccounts and all plans cap debit cards at 50 companywide. Lili only gives you a single subaccount.
Grasshopper Bank comes closest to matching Relay. Customers can open as many business checking and savings accounts as they need and manage them from one dashboard. While there’s no limit on the number of virtual debit cards you can issue, you can only have five active debit cards on an account at one time.
Free incoming wires, low-cost outgoing wires
I examined wire transfer fees for more than 50 business checking accounts. Relay's are among the lowest available. All incoming wires are free. Outgoing domestic wires are just $8.
Need to send money internationally? International wires using the recipient’s local payment network are just $5. Local network wires can be sent to Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom and countries in the eurozone. You can also send international wires via the SWIFT network for $25 each.
Grow and Scale subscribers get even lower rates on outgoing wires.
Starter | Grow | Scale | |
|---|---|---|---|
Domestic wire | $8 | $5 | $5 |
International wire - local network | $5 | $3 | $1.50 |
International wire - SWIFT network | $25 | $22 | $20 |
Online business checking accounts typically charge $15 to send a domestic wire, and up to $45 to send a wire overseas. Fees at traditional banks can be even higher. (First Citizens tops out at a sky-high $100 fee for international, outgoing wires, for instance.)
A handful of business accounts do it better, though. Check out Mercury, Brex or Rho if wire transfers are core to your business. All wire transfers are free with these business accounts (currency exchange fees may apply).
Built-in bookkeeping functions
Missing receipts are a bookkeeping nightmare. Relay can help alleviate the headache.
You can require a receipt for every purchase with a Relay debit or credit card. Employees can upload receipts and manually categorize expenses before you sync transaction data with your accounting software. And Relay will email reminders if the cardholder forgets.
If you leverage Relay’s multi-account feature, your debit cards tie into your account setup. Each card draws from a specific checking account, with an optional backup account if the first runs short. That means a contractor can fund a debit card from a job account so crew purchases stay with that job.
Bill pay is included too. Relay syncs bills with accounting software QuickBooks Online and Xero, and imports your chart of accounts. That lets you assign categories to bills before they leave Relay. You can also set multi-step approval rules, so the right people sign off before money goes out the door.
Invoicing and payment links
Relay’s Starter plan includes free basic invoicing tools. You can create custom invoices with secure payment links. Adyen acts as the payment processor.
Don’t need a formal invoice? Send a request by email or text instead.
Either way, clients can pay by credit card, online bank transfer, ACH or wire. Processing fees apply, though. Card payments are 2.9% plus 30 cents per transaction. That’s pretty standard for online payments.
Grow and Scale plans unlock additional features. You can add a surcharge to cover processing fees when clients pay by credit card, for example. You also get a small discount on ACH payment fees. The Starter plan charges 1% of the transaction amount. That’s knocked down to 0.75% on Grow and 0.50% on Scale. All plans cap the ACH processing fee at $10 per transaction.
Where Relay business accounts fall short
Restrictive savings account
Every Relay customer gets a savings account when they open a Relay business checking account. You can set up automatic transfers from your operating account. That's great for building an emergency fund. But things can get tricky if you need to access those funds.
Relay’s business savings account doesn’t include checks, a debit card or ATM access. The only way to get money in or out is via internal transfer with a Relay Checking account. ACH transfers to a merchant or account at another bank are not allowed. Relay says internal transfers between accounts are instant. You’ll need to remember to do this, though.
You can get a higher interest rate — and easier access to your money — with a high-yield business savings account at a different institution. Some of our favorites earn more than 3% APY and have no monthly fee. You’d need the Scale plan ($90/month) to get that kind of return with Relay.
Low cash deposit limits
Relay offers cash deposits. That’s more than most online business accounts. But it’s still not ideal for regular cash deposits.
Deposits at Allpoint+ ATMs are free, but you’re capped at $1,000 per deposit and $2,000 per day. Green Dot deposits have tighter limits. Most retailers only accept $500 at a time and charge $4.95 per transaction. Daily, weekly and monthly limits also apply with Green Dot.
Need to deposit cash regularly? Consider NBKC business checking, which offers cash deposits at MoneyPass and Allpoint ATMs. Unlike Relay, NBKC doesn’t impose daily limits, though some ATMs may restrict individual deposits.
Chase is a good pick if you want branch access. Chase Business Complete Banking® includes up to $5,000 a month in free cash deposits. And there is no fee for deposits at Chase ATMs.
Account freezes
All banks screen for fraud. An unusual wire transfer or mismatched address can trigger an investigation — and lock up your funds in the meantime. These headaches can be bigger at fintechs like Relay, which have limited support channels and partner bank dependencies.
For instance, one customer told me that Relay froze more than $13,000 in his business checking account in August 2026. He couldn’t get a clear answer on what triggered the review or who held the funds — Relay or its partner, Thread Bank. Two months later, that money was still tied up in the investigation. Relay eventually said it would close his account and mail a check.
His experience isn’t isolated. Multiple Reddit users report similar issues with frozen accounts, minimal communication and long review times. There were enough bad reviews to prompt Relay CEO Yoseph West to address them in a March 2025 blog post. His post said that fewer than 1% of transactions trigger additional fraud screening.
I asked Relay about these complaints directly too.
"Relay and our bank partner, Thread Bank, are required to monitor accounts for fraud and compliance with banking regulations," a spokesperson told me. "To keep those protections effective, we don’t detail the specific signals or methods involved."
West’s post said that fewer than 1% of transactions trigger additional fraud screening. And Relay’s deposit agreement says account reviews can take 30 days or longer. That's "typical rather than guaranteed," Relay's spokesperson said.
Relay leans heavily on email and live chat for customer support, which adds to the frustration for impacted customers. While West gives a "direct phone line for impacted users" to talk to a real person, it's just Relay's general support line: 1-888-205-9304. And it's not staffed on the weekends. In fact, Relay doesn't offer any form of live customer support on the weekend.
Thread Bank has faced regulatory scrutiny too. In 2024, the FDIC issued an enforcement order requiring it to step up its suspicious activity monitoring and customer due diligence, particularly in its banking-as-a-service program, which includes Relay. The FDIC terminated the order in December 2025.
There’s no foolproof way to prevent freezes. The best option is to have a backup business account. If you’ll primarily work with Relay, consider a secondary account at a brick-and-mortar bank. U.S. Bank Business Essentials may be a nice fit. It has no monthly fee, so you won’t have to worry about a charge if you need to dip into it unexpectedly.
How we evaluated Relay business checking
NerdWallet’s writers and editors consider more than 20 data points for each business checking account we rate, scoring each on fees, perks and software tools, among other factors (view our complete ratings methodology). We gathered this information from Relay’s website and company representatives.
Our editorial team scores accounts from one to five stars overall, and in individual areas that are important for business banking. We only rate free accounts because that's the easiest way to standardize comparisons — plus, we know business owners can get a great account without a monthly fee.
Here's how Relay’s free business checking account stacks up:
- Transactions: No monthly transaction limit or fee for excess transactions. (Fees apply for wire transfers and instant transfers, as is the case with most business bank accounts.)
- Domestic ATM access: No fee at Allpoint ATMs; $1,000 daily withdrawal limit.
- Cash deposits: Available at Allpoint+ ATMs (up to $2,000 per day) and Green Dot retailers (daily, monthly and per-transaction limits apply). Fees apply to Green Dot deposits.
- Wire transfers: International and domestic wire transfers available (incoming and outgoing).
- Minimum opening deposit: $0.
- Checks: Can send checks on your behalf. Account owners can also order checks through a third party.
- Human support phone hours: Extended business hours: 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. ET Monday - Friday. No weekend support.
- App store rating: 4.77 (weighted average of the Apple and Google Play app stores).
- Ease of website use: Easy to navigate.
- Branch access: None (online only).
- Account availability: Nationwide.
- Account opening options: Online or via the Relay mobile app.
- Live chat support: Yes.
- Monthly maintenance fee: $0.
- ATM withdrawal fee: Relay does not charge ATM fees. Third-party fees may apply outside of the Allpoint ATM network.
- Cash deposit fee: No fee for deposits at Allpoint+ ATMs. Green Dot retailers charge $4.95 per deposit.
- Wire transfer fees: Free incoming wires. Outgoing wires: $8 (domestic); $5 via local payment network, $25 via SWIFT (international).
- Overdraft fee: $0.
- APY: Relay business checking does not earn interest.
- Sign-up bonus: None.
Relay business checking earned additional points for software features thanks to the following:
- Built-in invoicing.
- Sub-accounts.
- Expense management with receipt capture.
We also look at public forums (like Reddit, myFICO and Quora) and online reviews (via sites like Trustpilot and the App Store/Google Play) to understand business owner sentiment about banking with Relay. We use AI tools to help gather some of this information for evaluation.
People post anonymously in these spaces, so we cannot confirm their individual experiences or circumstances. This data does not influence our star ratings. However, NerdWallet does contact financial institutions regarding negative feedback that we consistently observe.
How to open a Relay business bank account
To open a Relay business account, you need to provide the following information for all beneficial owners. That includes anyone with at least a 25% stake in the business, as well as certain executives, such as the chief executive officer, chief financial officer, chief operating officer and/or the company’s treasurer.
- Government-issued photo identification.
- Passport or Social Security number.
- Personal address and phone number.
- Business address and phone number.
- Email address.
The online application will also ask about:
- Entity types.
- Number of employees.
- Annual revenue.
- Target market/typical customer.
- Monthly transaction volume.
- Funding sources for the business (original and ongoing).
- Business reach (local, regional, nationwide, international).
You also need to upload certain business documents with your application. Select your business entity type to see which documents Relay requires.
- Employer identification number or Social Security number.
- DBA certificate, if applicable.
- EIN and EIN verification letter.
- Partnership registration form (may be required).
- Company bylaws (may be required).
- EIN and EIN verification letter.
- Company bylaws (may be required, depending on state filed in).
- Articles of incorporation (may be required).
- EIN and EIN verification letter.
- Articles of organization or certificate of formation (may be required).
- Operating agreement (may be required; for multi-member LLCs filed in California, Delaware, Maine, Missouri and New York).
Notes from providers
Relay is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services provided by Thread Bank, Member FDIC. The Relay Visa Debit Card is issued by Thread Bank, Member FDIC, pursuant to a license from Visa U.S.A. Inc. and may be used anywhere Visa cards are accepted.
Mercury is a fintech company, not an FDIC-insured bank. Banking services provided through Choice Financial Group and Column N.A., Members FDIC.