Cards were created to ease the transaction of using paper bills and coins with a single swipe. Today, however, virtual cards simplify remote payments with the touch of a button. What is a virtual card to begin with?
As the name suggests, virtual cards are neither plastic nor physical but a card with a set of 16 random numbers generated by the software. With it, you have an option of whether to use it for credit or debit payments. These virtual payment cards are linked to your debit or credit account and can only be used to make remote payments. So, if you try to make an in-person transaction using your virtual cards, it will not be accepted.
Additionally, because it uses randomly generated numbers linked to your account, hackers won’t be able to trace the original account and access it to use the money. You can also protect yourself from unfamiliar and risky suppliers, preventing them from charging you more than what should be.
For these reasons, more people, especially businesses, use virtual cards for safer and more seamless transactions. Speaking of business, here are brilliant ways to incorporate virtual cards into your company:
- Monitor Company Ads Expenses
Monitoring expenses is one of the excellent reasons why your business should have a virtual card. With this, you can keep track of your company’s expenses, especially when it comes to your advertising spendings. In addition, you’ll be able to check if you’re going over your reserved ads budget.
As you know, it’s easy to place an ad campaign on most social media platforms, and with a simple click of a button, your ads are good to go. However, with virtual cards, you can create a strict spending limit to make sure that all of your transactions are meant for important ads only.
- Encourage Teamwork Through Shared Expenses
Creating different cards for various departments and teams is not good news for you and your company’s finances. Every department may potentially overspend according to its budget, resulting in financial losses. What should you do, then? Should you still opt to create a virtual card for every department? This may sound like a good idea to help them monitor and track their spending. However, it may still result in synchronized overspending.
The best thing you can employ is to create a single virtual card to be used by all teams. This way, they can plan every spending and not go over the budget limit. With this, you also help your teams to collaborate and communicate properly with each other.
Having a virtual card is like hitting two birds with one stone. You can reduce losses and help your teams from different departments work together toward the same goal.
- Remove Petty Cash From Your System
Why do you need to remove petty cash from your system? Why is it bad for your company?
Petty cash is a fund usually kept inside the office for office expenditures, such as office supplies. It is typically used to purchase small and manageable items. However, the problem does not lie with the expenses but in how it is maintained.
As petty cash is just around the office, someone should keep an eye on it, recording every expense where it was used. If it’s not tracked properly, it may result in gradually increasing losses. With that said, it is more effective and efficient to have a virtual card you can use for transactions concerning office expenditures.
With virtual cards, you don’t have to ask someone to record every movement of your money. You don’t even have to store cash in the office, reducing all the risks petty cash has, including unintentional fraud.
- Manage Current Subscriptions
Subscriptions are one of the essential factors that keep your business moving. Your subscription to software programs helps your team and other departments to be more productive and collaborative. These could be in the form of communication software, cloud-based storage, and many more.
While subscriptions are vital expenses for your company, you may not notice how much you are spending on them, especially if some are not as useful as others. With virtual cards, you can track your subscription expenses and cancel those that are not beneficial to your company.
Besides, virtual cards allow you to save more time and effort as you can put your transactions on auto-pilot, meaning there’s no need for you to renew and pay for your subscription manually. Another good thing about these cards is that you will be notified in case there’s an increase in price concerning your subscriptions.
- Secure Your Finances Properly
The reason why businesses use virtual cards is not that they sound fancy but because of their ability to secure your accounts from fraudsters and hackers. As mentioned, virtual cards are linked to your company accounts. However, unlike physical cards, which can be traced and accessed by trackers using the numbers on the card, virtual cards have extra layers of protection.
Virtual cards protect your accounts by using randomly produced digits in place of the numbers found on your card. With this, it would be impossible to track the original account linked to these cards, protecting you and your company from financial credit breaches and other potential risks.
Moreover, there are instances where physical cards are linked to the owner’s personal account. Thus, if a team loses the card of its manager, that account may be at risk, especially if it falls into the wrong hands. Therefore, virtual cards are the way to go if you’re looking for safe transactions.
- Use It For Fun And Exciting Activities
Are you planning to give your team exciting and relaxing out-of-town getaways or sumptuous dinners? However, are you worried about going over the budget limit? If you’re using physical cards to pay for your travel necessities, you may purchase extra things that you don’t need. Don’t worry, though, because a virtual card can help you save more.
With virtual cards, you can create a strict limit for expenses, thereby avoiding unnecessary purchases. You may consider creating a virtual card only for this purpose and assign a monthly or quarterly budget, which a team may use to enjoy fun activities. If you need an idea of where to spend the budget best, you may want to try going to an escape room or other team-building activities.
Likewise, virtual cards give you the flexibility to use the money allotted for its specific purpose and the visibility to track your expenses.
- Encourage Your Team To Learn More
Do you want your team to learn more and upgrade their skills? You may enroll them in online education websites. Still, even with these websites, you may overspend on courses that may not benefit your company. Thus, the first thing you need to do is assess what courses would help your team and the company. The next step is determining how you would pay for these courses.
Instead of using physical cards that may be hard to track, you may set up a virtual card dedicated to this purpose. You may set up a budget for your team to use every time they need to upgrade their skills. If you have a small team, you may also give them a virtual card and let them use it on courses they wish to enroll in.
- Give Back To Charity
Good deeds result in positive and beneficial effects for your team’s mental health and the company as a whole. These can also build your company’s reputation in the process. Whether you do it as a company tradition or as a corporate social responsibility project, setting up a virtual card dedicated to serving the community would be your best option.
Using virtual cards for your charity works can help track your expenses. They also ensure that your money goes to the right people who need help. You may also give your staff a designated monthly budget for their chosen charity. Eventually, this may help them grow and develop not only as an employee but a renewed person as well.
Final Words
Virtual cards are non-plastic nor physical, and can only be used for online transactions. Unlike physical cards, they cannot be used in in-person payments.
In addition, virtual cards offer a safer and more secure payment method than physical cards. Compared with physical cards, virtual cards cannot be easily traced by hackers, so original accounts linked to them are protected. Because of this, more businesses and individuals are taking advantage of the advantages and convenience virtual cards bring, especially for those who mostly purchase their everyday items through online transactions.
That’s not all, though. Virtual cards may offer your business more than financial security. With these cards, you can track and monitor your expenses (from departmental to the company in general), set a spending limit, and ensure flexibility. Furthermore, you may set up a virtual card that may be used for other purposes, such as skill upgrading, giving back to charity, and many others.
Author Bio
“Kent Nelson is a digital marketing expert. He has been in the industry for more than 14 years. He conducts webinars and writes blogs, sharing his expertise with aspiring marketers and startups. During his free time, Kent loves scuba diving, boating, and fishing.”
