Compass to Care saves 2 hours per week on card funding
About Compass to Care
Compass to Care provides free Non Emergency Medical Transportation (NEMT) to families undergoing childhood cancer treatment and clinical trials. Michelle Ernsdorff-May founded the organization after her own personal experience with kidney cancer, where she witnessed her parents’ financial struggle with travel expenses.
"PEX expands our ability to help children with cancer who are living in poverty. Quickly providing funds for treatment-related travel, combined with spending controls, has saved us more than ten hours a month, and allows us to support families on their journey to treat childhood cancer."
Michelle Ernsdorff-May, Founder of Compass to Care
The challenge
When Compass to Care launched in 2009, they started by funding flights and occasional lodging, later expanding to car transportation through Uber & Lyft. Managing fund distribution became increasingly challenging for Michelle. Following social workers’ advice not to provide advanced funding, she first tried cutting checks but found the process time-consuming and lacking transparency.
“When I first started Compass to Care, social workers advised me not to provide funds to families too far in advance. If we sent them a blank check, we wouldn’t know where the money was going. We wanted to stay mission-focused and provide financial support only for travel.”
A switch to bank-issued credit cards required families to submit trip request forms, but Michelle would often receive last-minute funding calls during off-hours. The system became problematic when her account was flagged for fraud due to inputting multiple social security numbers. An alternative solution using Global Cash cards removed spending control capabilities, leading Michelle to search for a better option.
The solution
Compass to Care partnered with PEX in 2021. “PEX seemed like the perfect solution for us,” said Michelle. She immediately started using PEX Visa® Prepaid Cards to quickly deliver funding to families based on their unique needs, saving over two hours each week in funding cards. Michelle said, “With the cards we used previously, families would have to ask for money every single time, which is very humbling. Families no longer worry about forgotten funding requests or card denials. PEX is a security blanket in their pocket.”
PEX made it easy to track every dollar spent with spend controls, automated reporting into transactions and AI-based receipt matching. After Michelle preloaded each card, she added merchant-specific spending controls that guaranteed that funds were used appropriately, reinforcing Compass to Care’s mission.
Then, once funds were spent, Michelle received real-time reporting into transactions and her grantees used PEX to email and text their receipts in. This not only resulted in 95% increased efficiency in fund management and accounting through automated distribution, but also freed up more than two hours per week for Michelle to focus on her mission supporting families in need.
The results
Achieved 95% increased efficiency
in fund management and accounting through automated distribution. The PEX platform enables quick card funding and sends automatic notifications to recipients when funds are available
2 hours saved per week funding cards
Compass to Care can now quickly see, add and track transactions and trips funded, helping them demonstrate impact to donors and granters
Enabled organizational scaling
without significant staffing increases. PEX's instant card funding and spend controls eliminated the need for manual data entry, allowing the organization to grow efficiently
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