If you’re a business owner, then you know it feels great to make a profit. You’re also painfully aware how quickly that sense of excitement evaporates when it’s time to pay the bills. Corporate card programs can help, but there may be a better way to manage online and telephone payments than physical cards.
Virtual credit cards, virtual debit cards, and other virtual payment cards give you more tools to manage your payments. Here’s how they work, how you may benefit, and whether it’s time for your company to add them to your payment program.
What is a virtual credit card?
A virtual credit card and other virtual payment cards combine some of the best aspects of regular credit and debit cards with modern business banking. Instead of being issued on a traditional plastic cards, they are generated in the cloud and are simply a set of numbers. Virtual debit cards are funded with prepaid accounts. Virtual credit cards are funded with lines of revolving credit that you have to apply for. The terms “virtual credit card” and “virtual debit card” are often used interchangeably.
What makes virtual cards so useful?
Virtual cards can be used to manage online and telephone transactions. You don’t need a physical card to handle these transactions, and keeping them on dedicated virtual cards can give you important controls. For example, you can use one virtual card for each of your online advertising outlets. This makes it easier to evaluate your return on investment. Or, you can keep all of your online subscriptions on one virtual card. Then, you can review that card’s spending to see if you are paying for subscriptions that you no longer.
You can cut your losses
One-time-use virtual cards, sometimes known as ghost cards, can be used to sign up for trial offers, then cancelled when the trial ends. They also can be used for telephone transactions to limit the risk of someone overhearing the card information and then stealing it.
One 2016 case study examined a company that spent millions on corporate travel each year. Virtual payment cards let the firm expand its business to regions that weren’t too friendly to corporate cards and cut down on overseas fraud.
You can track expenses in your sleep
With Bento for Business, virtual cards can be integrated into your payment program so that you can see all of your transactions in one place. Whether you use plastic debit cards, virtual debit cards, ACH, or a Bento Pay email payment for a transaction, all of the information is one a single dashboard. It can be tagged for analysis and integrated into your accounting system.
Should you add a virtual credit card or virtual debit card to your payment program?
The workforce of the future is distributed, streamlined and mobile. Bento for Business makes it easy to put these and other benefits into action at your company. Learn more by calling 866.220.8455 or sign up for a free 60-day trial today to experience the significant advantages firsthand.
