Bree team L-R Alice Crawley, Mireille Boutros, Carolina Flores
Two working mums who became so fed up with how much time bills were taking up in their busy lives have created an app that automates bill payments and searches for better deals, giving Australians back precious time and money, and putting an end to late fees forever.
New bill management app Bree was designed for people who can’t find the time to manage or pay bills, hate paying avoidable late fees and who struggle to find the headspace to compare deals and swap providers, even though they desperately want to save money.
Research conducted by Bree found that in most (60%) households women manage the bills, they spend around three hours per month paying bills and more than half (53%) paid a late fee because they forgot about a bill payment.
Meanwhile, the Commonwealth Bank estimates that Australians are forking out more than $280 million in late fees annually, with the average late fee costing $24.
After having children, time-poor new mothers Mireille Boutros and Carolina Flores set about finding ways to use technology to make their lives easier by automating menial but important tasks like paying bills and searching for better deals.
“We want to give hard-working Australians, especially working mums, their most precious resource back – their time. Bree is like a personal assistant for everyday Australians – she makes sure all your bills are paid on time so you can kiss late fees goodbye and she is always on the lookout for the best deals from competing providers, removing hours of annoying life admin and saving users up to $950* annually,” Bree Chief Executive Officer Mireille Boutros said.
“I have two children under the age of two – the idea that I have time for another webinar on financial literacy or a spare moment to find a better electricity deal is laughable. People talk about empowering women and breaking the glass ceiling but to do that we need to remove the shackles that slow mums down, like doing menial, automatable tasks. We created Bree to make women’s lives easier and claw back some precious time while still ensuring all the menial but important money tasks are taken care of.”
*During a pilot of Bree’s bill comparison service, participants saved on average between $320 and $950 per year on their bills by switching to a more cost-effective provider.
For more information or to download Bree visit meetbree.com.au
About Bree
Meet Bree, Australia’s automated bill payment app which makes paying bills a breeze. The new app, a Buy Now Pay Later for bills, manages and pays bills for members for a small monthly fee. Members simply download the app, upload their bills and Bree automatically covers them every month. Bree pays the bills on time every time and members pay Bree in easy interest-free instalments. Like a personal assistant for life admin, Bree also looks for the cheapest utility providers and coordinates the switch in just a few clicks. At $14.28/month, Bree costs around the same as a streaming service or magazine subscription but gives members something priceless in return – time and peace of mind.
Meet the women behind Bree
Mireille Boutros, Bree Chief Executive Officer. Mireille was a born entrepreneur, starting her first side hustle when she was 14 and going on to manage, create or work on dozens more jobs and projects in the years that followed. She started her own user-centred digital media agency at the age of 22, built one of Australia’s first Conversion Rate Optimisation boutiques, and created a driving business to provide secure ongoing employment for her immigrant parents. She has more than 17 years of experience as an entrepreneur and investor including ground roots involvement in Fintech-driven ventures such as MoneyBrilliant (which was sold to AMP then bought by Westpac), money coaching site Best Financial Friend, The Institute of Money Coaching, social savings app Ambr (in progress) and now Bree. The hard-working mum-of-two, whose family emigrated from Lebanon, also mentors women in start-ups for Rare Birds, and prides herself on having a career, fulfilling her passions and being a full time mum, with the hope that Bree will make it possible for more women to ‘have it all’.
Carolina Flores, Bree Chief Marketing Officer. Born and raised in Mexico, Carolina has a unique perspective on personal finance and how women in different parts of the world and socio-economic environments manage their finances. She has brought this perspective, and her expertise in marketing and business growth, to many not-for-profit and international companies such as Credit Union Foundation Australia which helped empower impoverished people in Cambodia, as well as social savings app Ambr, which was inspired by the women in her family who band together with their community to manage their financial responsibilities. Carolina is a new mother who juggles a job at AusBiz with ongoing work on Ambr and Bree.
Alice Crawley, Bree Chief Expansion Officer. Rounding out the female leadership team at Bree is Alice – a transformation leader, speaker and executive coach, who empowers others on their path to personal and financial freedom through the same techniques she used to dramatically change her self-worth and net worth. Alice literally wrote the book on how to get out of debt. In her self-published autobiography – On the way to Wonderland, Alice’s journey from financially f*cked to freedom – Alice shares her incredible story of tripling her salary in less than a year to pay off $185,000 in credit card debt, all while battling myriad addictions and mental health challenges.