Business Continuity
What American Express Wants Finance Leaders to Know About Virtual Cards
Business payments are changing quickly. More purchases happen online, more employees need to spend on behalf of their organization, and subscription-based services have become part of everyday operations. At the same time, finance teams still need visibility, security, and control.
That combination helps explain why virtual cards are gaining momentum. In a recent SAP Concur Conversations episode, Widad Chaoui, Senior Vice President of Corporate and B2B Solutions for American Express joined our host, Jeanne Dion of SAP Concur to discuss how virtual cards are evolving from a specialized payment method into a practical tool for businesses of every size.
Their conversation highlighted four key ideas for organizations evaluating where virtual cards may fit within their payment and expense programs:
1. Virtual cards match the way business spending happens today
The idea behind a virtual card is not entirely new. Single-use payment cards have existed for years, but what has changed is the range of controls, digital capabilities, and business scenarios that can now be built around them.
Today, more payments happen through online portals and subscription-based services, including software, advertising, logistics, and AI tools. Spending is also more distributed. A purchase that may once have been handled by a dedicated procurement employee can now fall to almost anyone across the organization. Virtual cards are designed for that environment. Organizations can issue a payment token for a defined purpose and establish controls around:
- Who can use it
- How much can be spent
- Where the payment can be made
- When the card can be used
- How long the card remains active
This makes the payment method flexible for employees while allowing finance teams to establish boundaries before the transaction takes place.
“People want consumer-grade digital experiences in their working lives.” — Widad Chaoui
The opportunity extends well beyond large enterprises. One persistent misconception is that virtual cards are only suitable for global companies undertaking complex payment transformations. Chaoui emphasized that the technology can support businesses of nearly any size; the use case simply changes with the organization. A small business owner may use a virtual card to allow another employee to make purchases against the company account. A large enterprise may need to issue cards to hundreds of temporary workers, contractors, or summer interns for a specific project. The same principle applies in both cases: give the right person access to the right amount of money for the right purpose, without creating a permanent, general-purpose card arrangement. Because a virtual card can extend an existing commercial card program, organizations may also benefit from established credit lines, cash-flow management, easier reconciliation, and fraud protections.
2. The best use cases begin with a point of friction
The range of possible applications can be one of the biggest barriers to getting started. When everything seems possible, organizations can struggle to identify the first practical step. Rather than starting with the technology, Chaoui suggested looking first at how work gets done today:
- Where are employees encountering friction?
- Where is spend difficult to control or reconcile?
“A virtual card is a means to an end. The organization first needs to be clear about the outcome it wants to achieve; the virtual card becomes the how.” — Widad Chaoui
Asking questions like these can help organizations identify the most practical starting point:
- Where are employees waiting for physical cards?
- Where is finance chasing receipts or reconciling recurring charges?
- Where is spending leaking outside approved processes?
- Where would added controls reduce risk without slowing the business down?
“I like to think about virtual cards as the vehicle for the ultimate communion between finance teams and folks in the field… eliminating that internal friction that might exist between the two. I think that’s an incredibly important point, and one that’s so valuable to businesses.” — Widad Chaoui
Several examples from the podcast also show how this approach can work:
- Temporary workers and interns: A virtual card can be issued immediately, loaded into a mobile wallet, and limited to designated days, hours, merchants, or categories.
- Infrequent travelers: Employees who travel only once or twice a year can avoid paying personally while the organization maintains visibility and control.
- Recurring suppliers and subscriptions: A dedicated virtual card can be placed in a vendor portal for a specific monthly amount, simplifying reconciliation and helping protect the primary account.
- Client entertainment and events: Sales employees can receive a defined amount for a particular occasion without being issued an unrestricted corporate card.
The virtual card is not the strategy by itself, instead, it's the mechanism that supports a clearly defined business outcome.
3. Speed and control no longer have to compete
Finance leaders have often felt forced to choose between two imperfect options: empower employees and risk losing visibility or impose tighter controls and create friction. Virtual cards can help collapse that trade-off.
“There’s a historical dichotomy between speed and control that really held businesses back.” — Widad Chaoui
Controls can be configured when the card is issued rather than enforced after the expense occurs. That means the employee can receive a fast, intuitive payment experience while finance teams know the transaction is operating within pre-established parameters.
As Dion noted in the podcast discussion, this also changes the cultural message. Instead of communicating distrust and then chasing employees after the fact, the organization can effectively say, "We trust you to spend for this purpose, and we have designed the process to support you."
Chaoui contrasted that with an older model of business travel: receive a physical card, keep every receipt, and complete the expense process correctly or risk not being reimbursed. That anxiety can pull employees away from the work the trip or purchase was intended to accomplish. The goal is an adaptive digital ecosystem in which employees can make appropriate purchases without constantly thinking about the administrative process behind them.
4. Integration, service, and trust determine the experience
A virtual card becomes more valuable when it is part of the systems employees and administrators already use. Chaoui discussed how an integrated experience can allow an employee to request a payment token within the SAP Concur environment, receive spending access quickly, and have transaction information flow into the expense process.Program administrators may also be able to issue virtual cards in bulk to a defined group and manage aggregate spending against a project or initiative.
“Building a brand like American Express with its DNA anchored in trust and service and having the back of its customers is something that we’ve built over decades and decades of consistent delivery.” — Widad Chaoui
But integration alone isn't enough. Employees still need a clear support path when a payment is declined, a control needs to be adjusted, or something goes wrong while they are traveling. As payment methods become more embedded across connected platforms, organizations and their partners need to make the servicing model just as seamless as the transaction itself.
Trust also depends on security. Although a virtual card may feel less tangible than a physical card, its tokenization and narrowly defined controls can reduce exposure. A card can be restricted to one merchant, one amount, or one time period—and can be frozen quickly if fraud or a dispute occurs.
A Practical Way to Begin
Organizations do not need to redesign their entire payment program at once. A more manageable approach is to identify one high-friction workflow, define the outcome the business wants, and test whether a virtual card can make that process easier and more controlled. Questions to consider include:
- Where are employees paying out of pocket or waiting too long for access to company funds?
- Which recurring or one-time purchases are difficult to reconcile?Where are finance teams relying on after-the-fact review instead of preventative controls?
- Which employee groups need temporary or narrowly scoped spending access?
- How could an integrated payment experience reduce manual expense work?
- Where are payment controls weakest today, creating opportunities for fraud or misuse?
The larger opportunity is not simply replacing a physical card with a digital one. Instead, organizations should start rethinking how it can enable employees to spend, how finance teams manage risk, and how payment data moves through the broader expense ecosystem.
“The more you use virtual cards, the more they offer use cases and opportunities for you to potentially transform your business.” — Widad Chaoui
As virtual card adoption grows, organizations may find that the first successful use case leads naturally to the next. Chaoui described this as a virtuous cycle: the more businesses use virtual cards, the more opportunities they discover to transform other workflows.
Listen to the full conversation
Hear Jeanne Dion and Widad Chaoui discuss the growth of virtual cards, the employee experience, fraud controls, embedded payments, and what organizations should consider as they get started. Play the episode
