Updated: May 2026
mika is like software and a tax firm in one: the complete bookkeeping of your GmbH, UG or AG (German limited companies and stock corporations) including the Jahresabschluss (the annual financial statement), the balance sheet and all three tax returns.
Spend management tools like Candis, Moss, Pleo, Spendesk and Circula are not bookkeeping software. They digitise the spending side (company cards, receipt capture, approvals, travel expenses). They do not do the account assignment, the Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung (the monthly VAT return), the balance sheet or the Jahresabschluss, and that stays the job of your bookkeeping software or your Steuerberater (a licensed German tax advisor).
Spend management and mika are not competitors, they sit side by side quite sensibly. Spend management controls who buys what. With mika the bookkeeping takes care of itself.
Spend management is the digitisation of a company's spending side. The category is established, the tools are mature, the feature set varies by provider, and the core is similar everywhere:
The five tools that show up most often in German GmbHs cover these functions to differing degrees.
Candis focuses on incoming invoices: collecting supplier invoices, OCR, a multi-stage approval workflow, export to DATEV or Lexware. No card of its own. The focus is digital invoice approval for companies with complex internal approval processes. According to trusted.de, package prices start at around 369 euros per month, staggered by invoice volume.
Moss is a Berlin platform for company cards plus spend management. Virtual and physical cards with limits, receipt capture through the app, AI-assisted pre-assignment of accounts, two-way sync with DATEV, Lexware and sevDesk. A platform price plus a volume based fee, and according to OMR there is a free tier as well as packages in the low three figures per year.
Pleo is a Danish provider, very widespread in Germany. Smart company cards, receipt capture through the app, automatic matching to card transactions, an approval flow, DATEV and Lexoffice connections. Three plans: Starter (free, 2 users), Essential (€39/month on an annual contract), Advanced (€79/month on an annual contract) according to Pleo Pricing.
Spendesk is French, with a strong focus on mid-sized and larger companies. Cards, expenses, approvals, vendor management, virtual cards with limits of up to 200,000 euros per transaction, DATEV export in SKR03 and SKR04. Price on request, and generally positioned for companies from 50 employees upwards.
Circula is the Berlin specialist for travel expenses, subsistence costs and employee benefits. A GoBD certified mobile app with OCR, automatic per diem calculation at the BMF rates, currency conversion for trips abroad, DATEV integration. By its own account more than 3,000 companies and 250,000 users. DATEV recommends it as the successor to DATEV Reisekosten classic.
Different as these five tools are in detail, they share a common architecture: they sit in front of the bookkeeping, not inside it. They pass data and receipts on to the bookkeeping downstream in a structured form. They do not produce the finished booking, the Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung or the Jahresabschluss. The trade literature puts it clearly: spend management tools can usually be integrated into bookkeeping software without trouble, but they are not a substitute for it.
A GmbH, UG or AG is required to prepare accounts: double entry bookkeeping, a balance sheet, a profit and loss account, a corporate income tax return, a trade tax return, an annual VAT return and publication in the Bundesanzeiger (the German federal gazette). No spend management tool delivers any of that. It is not their job and not their promise.
mika is like software and a tax firm in one. With mika's AI you get the receipt checks, the account assignment, the ongoing bookkeeping, the Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung, the Jahresabschluss, the balance sheet, the profit and loss account and the corporate income tax, trade tax and annual VAT returns. Trained bookkeepers (Steuerfachangestellte and Bilanzbuchhalter, the German bookkeeping qualifications) do the quality control on the ongoing books. You file straight from mika, without your own ELSTER certificate. For the routine you do not need a Steuerberater on top. If you want to keep an existing relationship with a firm, you keep it and use mika for the ongoing bookkeeping. For complex tax questions mika matches you with a partner from its network when you need one.
The usual feature table compares what tools can do. This table compares what you, as the managing director of a GmbH, want to have finished at the end.
Spend management tools have improved their OCR and data extraction enormously in recent years. Fields are read, data is extracted, sometimes plausibility is checked. What they do not promise: a VAT check. Whether the supplier's tax number is right, whether every mandatory detail under section 14 UStG (the German VAT Act) is there, whether the VAT rate fits the service, whether the address is correct: that is not their core business. It only surfaces when your Steuerberater takes a look or the Finanzamt (the German tax office) asks.
At mika the AI checks every receipt for the VAT rate, the recipient, the address and the mandatory details under section 14 UStG. Where there is doubt, the bookkeepers take a look. That saves corrections later on and it saves real money. A missing tax number or a wrong VAT rate on a supplier invoice costs you the 19 percent input VAT refund on the invoice amount. On €500 of goods purchased that is €95, simply gone.
Account assignment, meaning putting every booking on an account such as "office supplies" or "marketing costs", is the real craft of bookkeeping. At spend management tools it is a suggestion. Moss and Pleo do AI-assisted pre-assignment, Candis suggests SKR03 or SKR04 accounts, Circula supplies a booking suggestion for each travel expense line. That is good, but it is a suggestion. The finished booking is confirmed in the bookkeeping software downstream or at your Steuerberater. It requires an understanding of bookkeeping, otherwise you get correction costs at the firm.
With mika's AI the account assignment happens automatically at line item level, even on complex invoices with different VAT rates, a catering invoice with 7 percent on the food and 19 percent on the service for example. Trained bookkeepers do the quality control. You do not need any prior bookkeeping knowledge.
Something many people underestimate: since April 2026 mika has run its own bookkeeping ledger, independent of DATEV, and allows custom HGB accounts on top of SKR03 and SKR04. In practice that means: if your business does not fit the standard charts of accounts, say a holding with three subsidiaries, a SaaS business with staggered revenue recognition or a product mix with one-off revenue, you can set up your own accounts and structures in mika that match your reality.
Account assignment, meaning putting every booking on an account such as "office supplies" or "marketing costs", is the real craft of bookkeeping. At spend management tools it is a suggestion. Moss and Pleo do AI-assisted pre-assignment, Candis suggests SKR03 or SKR04 accounts, Circula supplies a booking suggestion for each travel expense line. That is good, but it is a suggestion. The finished booking is confirmed in the bookkeeping software downstream or at your Steuerberater. It requires an understanding of bookkeeping, otherwise you get correction costs at the firm.
With mika's AI the account assignment happens automatically at line item level, even on complex invoices with different VAT rates, a catering invoice with 7 percent on the food and 19 percent on the service for example. Trained bookkeepers do the quality control. You do not need any prior bookkeeping knowledge.
Something many people underestimate: since April 2026 mika has run its own bookkeeping ledger, independent of DATEV, and allows custom HGB accounts on top of SKR03 and SKR04. In practice that means: if your business does not fit the standard charts of accounts, say a holding with three subsidiaries, a SaaS business with staggered revenue recognition or a product mix with one-off revenue, you can set up your own accounts and structures in mika that match your reality.
The monthly VAT return is routine for a GmbH, but it has to run reliably. With mika the AI calculates the Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung from the bookings, the bookkeepers check it and you approve it. You can file straight from mika and you do not need your own ELSTER certificate for it.
Spend management tools do not file an Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung. That is not their job. The Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung is done either by your bookkeeping software (Lexoffice, sevDesk, DATEV) or by your Steuerberater.
This is where the difference is clearest. Spend management tools deliver receipts and data to the bookkeeping downstream. The balance sheet, the profit and loss account, the notes, corporate income tax, trade tax, the annual VAT return and publication in the Bundesanzeiger are not part of the product. For a GmbH, UG or AG that means: spend management plus bookkeeping software plus a Steuerberater.
With mika you get the complete Jahresabschluss in the "Bookkeeping and financial statements" plan. The balance sheet, the profit and loss account and the notes under HGB (the German Commercial Code) are prepared from the ongoing bookkeeping, you approve them as the managing director and you file them. You do not need your own ELSTER certificate for it. The Bundesanzeiger XML for publication is included. For the eBilanz (the electronic balance sheet filing) mika works together with eBilanzPlus.
If you have freelancers submitting receipts every month, or employees paying with their own card, you need a clear workflow. mika has a native 5-step process for it: enter the expense, validate the receipts, confirm, pay, done. External people submit through a public one-time link, without a mika login. Expenses without a receipt (tips, parking fees) you record with a description. Everything stays in the app. mika's AI assigns the expense to the right account automatically and the reimbursement is recorded as a payment. No double entry, no CSV export.
If your team travels a lot, Circula is the more specialised tool on this point. Per diem calculation, daily rates at the BMF rates, trips abroad with currency conversion, a GoBD certified app: that is Circula's core business. Moss and Spendesk cover travel expenses solidly too.
If your GmbH has two to five trips a month, mika's expense reimbursement is enough. If your entire sales team is on the road every week, Circula has the more specialised solution. Both can run at the same time: Circula for the trips, mika for the bookkeeping behind them.
mika is the first German bookkeeping solution with a native MCP server (Model Context Protocol) officially operated by the vendor, for Claude, ChatGPT and other LLM clients. Since March 2026, read-only, for every customer. You connect your AI tools straight to your mika data and ask bookkeeping questions with your real numbers as context. You ask Claude or ChatGPT: "how much cash will I have next month after the Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung?" or "which single supplier am I paying the most?" The answer comes out of your data, not off the internet.
Spend management tools mainly use AI for OCR and for pre-assigning accounts. A native MCP server for external AI tools such as Claude or ChatGPT is not standard in this category.
On top of that there is the mika Agent in the app. It has access to your own data and answers concrete questions like "why does this invoice have a to-do?", "show me all AWS invoices from Q3" or "what do I owe the Finanzamt this month?". The mika Agent also turns letters from the authorities into clear instructions. A letter from the Finanzamt saying "section 152 AO late filing penalty" becomes: "you filed the Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung late, the Finanzamt wants €50, and here is the deadline for appealing."
If you are in the middle of founding a GmbH or UG, the first few weeks are administrative routine: the Fragebogen zur steuerlichen Erfassung (the tax registration questionnaire), applying for a tax number, preparing an opening balance sheet.
mika solves the tax registration simply. You upload your incorporation documents, the wizard asks you a few questions, and after 10 to 15 minutes you can file. If you become a mika customer it is free. If not, it costs €49 one-off.
Spend management tools do not help with the formalities of founding a company, because that is not part of the category.
Three special cases that come up often in mika's audience: payroll for a growing GmbH, ecommerce with Stripe volume, and strategic tax questions where the advice goes beyond the routine.
Most spend management tools have open interfaces. Receipts captured in Pleo, Moss, Spendesk, Circula or Candis can be imported into mika without you typing them in a second time. There are usually three routes:
In practice: your team captures expenses, card transactions and supplier invoices in the spend management tool as usual. From there mika takes over the check under section 14 UStG, the account assignment under SKR03 or SKR04, the bank matching, the Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung and the Jahresabschluss. No double capture, no CSV back and forth, no break in the data.
A direct pricing table would be misleading here, because spend management and bookkeeping solve different problems. What can be said: spend management tools are often cheaper to start with, because they only solve part of the job. They replace neither bookkeeping software nor a Steuerberater. To meet a GmbH's accounting obligations you need a separate solution alongside them.
On top of that: bookkeeping software or a Steuerberater. A GmbH with a balance sheet total of €2.5 million and 10 employees pays €24,298/year to its Steuerberater at the StBVV mid-range fee (the StBVV is the German fee schedule that sets what a Steuerberater may charge). Bookkeeping software like sevDesk or Lexoffice only digitises that, the Steuerberater almost always stays in the picture, and the Jahresabschluss is billed separately.
mika scales with bank transactions per month, not with revenue and not with complexity. Six clear bands between €49 and €549 per month, anything above that as an individual quote.
A fair basis: effort, not revenue. For ecommerce and SaaS with the Pathway integration, only the supplier invoices count towards mika's pricing.
Standard plan (agencies, consultancies, B2B and B2C SaaS, ecommerce with Pathway, real estate either purely commercial or purely private):
Not every GmbH needs a spend management tool. The honest answer: above a certain size and complexity it starts to make sense, below that it is overhead.
Rule of thumb: spend management pays off if at least two of the following apply.
If none of those apply, spend management is oversized. A 5-person GmbH with one company credit card that the managing director uses personally and settles with receipts at the end of the month needs neither Pleo nor Moss. It needs clean bookkeeping. That is what mika does.
20 employees, around 50 bank transactions per month, regular marketing spend on cards, occasional travel. The setup: Pleo Essential for the card and receipt side, mika "Bookkeeping and financial statements" for the complete bookkeeping including the Jahresabschluss.
Spend management tools are not the wrong category, they solve a different problem from mika. Specifically:
For mika's typical audience, meaning a GmbH or UG with 3 to 30 employees, no internal finance team and no close tie to a Steuerberater, spend management is often a sensible addition but not a replacement for bookkeeping. The accounting obligations are met either by mika or by the Steuerberater, and in no case by the spend management tool.
For a GmbH, UG or AG, mika is the right choice if you want bookkeeping off your plate as a task. mika is like software and a tax firm in one. With mika the bookkeeping takes care of itself, including the Jahresabschluss, the balance sheet and the tax returns. Trained bookkeepers quality check the ongoing books. In the "Bookkeeping and financial statements" plan from €99 a month.
Spend management tools like Candis, Moss, Pleo, Spendesk and Circula are good tools for a company's spending side, worth it above a certain team size, but they replace neither bookkeeping software nor a Steuerberater. For a GmbH's account assignment, Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung, balance sheet, Jahresabschluss and tax returns you still need a separate solution. If you do not want that division of labour, mika is the obvious choice
As of May 2026.
mika has made my life so much easier and more efficient!
No. You do not need your own ELSTER certificate. You never have to log into ELSTER.
No, and that is not the claim. mika is the AI alternative to a tax firm, so bookkeeping including the Jahresabschluss. Pleo and Moss are spend management, so cards, receipt capture and approvals. If you want to issue company cards to a lot of employees, with approval workflows and per diem logic, you need a spend management tool. If you do not want to do the bookkeeping yourself, you need mika. For small GmbHs mika on its own is often enough. For bigger teams the two categories complement each other.
No. Pleo, Moss, Spendesk, Circula and Candis do no account assignment in the bookkeeping sense, no filing of the Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung with ELSTER, no Jahresabschluss, no balance sheet, no corporate income tax or trade tax return. They pass receipts and data on to your bookkeeping software or your Steuerberater. mika takes on that downstream work.
Yes. The typical setup: the spend management tool for cards, receipts at the point of spend, approvals and travel expenses. The data and receipts are passed on to mika (in the DATEV format, by email forwarding or over the API). mika takes on the checking, the account assignment, the Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung and the Jahresabschluss. This combination is common at GmbHs with 15 to 50 employees.
Rule of thumb: from around 15 to 20 employees, a high card volume per month or regular business travel with per diems. Below that, spend management is often overhead. A 5-person GmbH with one company credit card and occasional expenses gets along fine with mika and a banking solution.
An example calculation for a growing GmbH with 20 employees and 50 bank transactions per month: Pleo Essential at €39/month plus mika "Bookkeeping and financial statements" at €199/month. A total from around €2,858 per year for spend management plus complete bookkeeping including the Jahresabschluss. For comparison: Pleo plus a classic Steuerberater at the StBVV mid-range fee comes to €12,470 to €20,470 per year.
No. Candis is invoice approval software, not a bookkeeping tool. Candis helps with digital incoming invoices across several approval tiers and then exports to DATEV or Lexware. The actual bookkeeping happens afterwards, in DATEV, in Lexoffice or at your Steuerberater. mika takes that bookkeeping on completely, without you doing it yourself or buying it in externally.
For most GmbHs yes, for travel heavy teams no. mika has a 5-step workflow for expense reimbursement, including for external people over a public link. Circula specialises in travel expenses: per diems at the BMF rates, trips abroad with currency conversion, a GoBD certified app. If your team rarely travels, mika is enough. If your sales team is on the road every week, Circula plus mika is worth it.
Yes. mika exports your bookkeeping in the DATEV EXTF format at any time. You can hand the data to your Steuerberater without mika locking you in.
For the routine (the ongoing bookkeeping, the Umsatzsteuervoranmeldung, the Jahresabschluss, the balance sheet, corporate income tax, trade tax, the annual VAT return) mika is enough. If you need strategic tax advice, for complex shareholder structures or cross-border matters for example, mika will match you with a partner Steuerberater. A common setup: mika for the routine, your own Steuerberater for the strategy. The DATEV EXTF export is available at any time.
With mika the Jahresabschluss is included in the "Bookkeeping and financial statements" plan. The pricing scales with transactions per month: €99 at up to 25 transactions, €199 at up to 50, €549 at up to 150. So a small GmbH with up to 25 transactions per month pays around €1,188 per year for the complete bookkeeping plus the Jahresabschluss plus all three big tax returns. A typical agency with 50 transactions per month pays €2,388/year. For comparison: under the StBVV, the German fee schedule for Steuerberater, a GmbH with a balance sheet total of €2.5 million and 10 employees pays a mid-range €24,298/year to its Steuerberater, and over €40,000 at the top end.
By July after the end of the financial year. At classic firms it often takes until October or longer, because the financial statement is scheduled as a separate job. At mika it is part of the package and takes shape continuously out of the data that has already been checked.
All data on German servers, GDPR compliant, AWS infrastructure in Frankfurt. mika is built along the GoBD principles for proper bookkeeping in electronic form. Authentication with two-factor (a TOTP authenticator app).