Help centre/Dashboard basics

Boya dashboard features guide

Set up your organisation, manage people, monitor spending, make payments and control access. Follow it start to finish on your first day, or jump to the one task you came for.

Finance adminsApprovers8 min read
Section 1

Log in & get oriented

Sign in, find your way around, and know what to set up first.

Start by logging in and taking a look around. Once you can see the dashboard, work through the setup order below so employees, cards and approvals all land in the right place the first time.

Watch5 min
How to log in to Boya and a quick tour of the dashboard
The screen
The login screen and the dashboard you land on afterwards.
Setup orderCategoriesTeamsEmployeesPermissions & mandatesFund accountsStart transacting

Log in

You can continue with your work email or your phone number. Either way Boya sends a six-digit code to confirm it is you.

  1. 1Open the Boya dashboard.
  2. 2Choose Continue with email or Continue with phone number.
  3. 3Enter your email or phone number.
  4. 4Type the six-digit code you receive.
No code arriving? Check the number or email is the one your admin added, then request a new code.

What to set up first

New account? Do these five things before anyone spends.

Set up
Why it matters
Categories
Every expense gets grouped for reporting
Teams
Employees inherit reporting and limits from their team
Employees
People can only transact once they exist in Boya
Permissions & mandates
Decides who can act and who approves
Accounts & wallets
Money has to sit somewhere before it moves
Section 2

Pay, transfer, deposit & request

The four buttons on the dashboard overview and when to use each one.

The overview screen puts your everyday money actions in one row. Use Pay for bills and airtime, Transfer to move money between your own accounts, Deposit to top up, and Request when you need funds released to you.

Overview
Watch5 min
Overview: pay, transfer, deposit and request
The screen
The quick action row on the overview screen.
Action
Use it to
Pay
Pay a bill, buy airtime, or pay a vendor or till
Transfer
Move money between your own accounts and wallets
Deposit
Top up a Boya account from your bank or mobile money
Request
Ask for funds to be released to your wallet
Tip: Always pick the right category as you pay. It takes two seconds now and saves a recategorising session at month end.
Section 4

Expenses & insights

Review employee spend, categorise it, and export it for finance.

Expenses is where employee spending is reviewed. Spend Insights answers the monthly questions — which team spent most, which category is growing — and All Expenses lets you drill into the transactions behind the numbers.

Operations → Expenses
Watch
Expenses & insights
The screen
The expenses list, where filters and exports live.

Filter and export expenses

Operations → Expenses → All Expenses
  1. 1Open Operations → Expenses and select All Expenses.
  2. 2Set the date range you are reporting on.
  3. 3Filter by team, employee, category or currency.
  4. 4Check the totals shown above the list.
  5. 5Click Export to download the filtered expenses.

Spend Insights

Operations → Expenses → Spend Insights

Analyse spending by team, category and subcategory before you go into the detail.

Key actions: Filter by team, category, date range and currency; review total spend, averages, top categories and transaction count; then switch to All Expenses to drill in.

Tip: Export after filtering, not before. The download always matches exactly what is on screen.
Section 5

Payments, payouts, customers & taxes

Approve payments, track payouts, manage customers and withholding tax.

Payments is money going out. Each tab answers a different question, and anything waiting on you sits in For You Today until every required approver has acted.

Banking → Payments
Watch5 min
Payments, payouts, customers and taxes
The screen
The payments tabs, including approvals in For You Today.
Tab
Purpose
For You Today
Payments waiting for your approval
Payouts
View and track outgoing payments
Customers
Manage customer payment information
Taxes
Track withholding tax
New Bulk Payment
Initiate several payments at once

Approve a payment

Banking → Payments → For You Today
  1. 1Open Banking → Payments.
  2. 2Stay on For You Today.
  3. 3Open the payment and check amount, recipient and category.
  4. 4Approve or decline, adding a reason where asked.
If you are an approver, check For You Today daily. Payments stall until every approval level has acted.

Bills & vendors

Banking → Bills → Vendors

Manage vendors, invoices and bill approval workflows before paying them out.

Key actions: Add vendors, view outstanding and paid invoices, pay vendors, and configure approval workflows.

Section 6

Subscriptions

Track recurring payments and keep renewals from surprising you.

Subscriptions gathers your recurring spend in one place so you can see what renews, when, and on which card or account.

Operations → Subscriptions
Watch4 min
Subscriptions walkthrough
The screen
Recurring payments with their renewal dates.

Review your subscriptions

  1. 1Open Operations → Subscriptions.
  2. 2Review each subscription, its amount and its renewal date.
  3. 3Check which account or card it is charged to.
  4. 4Cancel or reassign anything you no longer need.

Key actions: See upcoming renewals, spot duplicates, and confirm the funding source.

Tip: Give subscriptions their own category. It makes recurring cost the easiest number to pull in a board pack.
Section 7

People & teams

Create teams, add employees, and manage roles and wallets.

Teams shape reporting and spending limits. Employees inherit their team, role and permissions, so build the teams first and adding people becomes a one-minute job.

Watch5 min
People: how to create a team and add employees
The screen
The People section, with Teams and Employees side by side.

Create a team

People → Teams

Teams organise employees and control access, spending and reporting.

  1. 1Open People → Teams.
  2. 2Click Create Team.
  3. 3Enter the team name and details.
  4. 4Save.

Add and manage employees

People → Employees

Most day-to-day changes live behind the ⋮ menu on an employee row.

Action
Where to find it
Add employee
Employees → Add Employee
Move employee
Employee → ⋮ → Move to Team
Change role
Employee → ⋮ → Edit Role
Manage permissions
Employee → ⋮ → Edit Permissions
Suspend employee
Employee → ⋮ → Suspend
View wallet
Employee → Financials
Add money
Employee → Financials → +
Section 8

Setup & controls

Categories, permissions, approval mandates and the audit trail.

This is the configuration behind everything else: how spend is grouped, who can do what, who approves it, and where the record of it all lives.

Watch
Setup & controls
The screen
Settings, where categories, permissions and mandates are configured.

Categories & subcategories

Settings → Categories

Categories group spend for reporting and reconciliation. Set them up before money starts moving.

  1. 1Click + New Category and enter a name.
  2. 2Add a description if it helps employees choose.
  3. 3Click Create.
  4. 4Select the category, click Add Subcategory for more detail, then save.
Keep the top-level list short and put the detail in subcategories — employees pick correctly more often.

Permissions & approval mandates

Settings → PermissionsSettings → Mandates

Set permissions per role or per employee, then define the approval levels a transaction must clear before it is paid.

Make sure the number of required approvers matches the people assigned to each approval level, or payments will stall.

Audit trail

Controls → Audit Trail

Records significant account activity, including logins and changes, for security and investigation.

Key actions: Review Digest or Events, filter by activity type, and search by description or person.

Section 9

Prerequisites for a successful transaction on Boya

Categories, Subcategories, Teams and why they are important

Successful transactions on Boya depend on meeting the required prerequisites, correct categorization and subcategorization, and assigning the right team to ensure proper routing, ownership, and efficient processing.

Watch
Categories, Subcategories, Teams
Section 9

Quick reference

Everything in the dashboard, grouped by the job it does.