What are corporate prepaid cards? In the 80s and 90s of the last century, coinciding with the tremendous economic take-off of technology, prior to the bursting of the bubble in the late 90s, it was really popular and frequent the figure of the corporate credit card.
At that time, prepaid cards were not yet widespread. In fact, the closest thing was the company debit card, in which the control of expenses was given by the shared use of certain accounts and the presentation of the corresponding receipts by the employees using the cards.
Today, the prepaid card concept has largely evolved the use of corporate cards.
First of all, you have to consider the very nature of prepaid cards to understand why they are better than other options such as credit cards.
By its very form, a prepaid card can work individually and only against the balance that has been deposited on it. This means that, for example, if different amounts are needed for different cards, it is perfectly possible to recharge them with the amounts needed for each of them.
On the other hand, once the available balance on the card is exhausted, it cannot be used in any way. This was a problem that with corporate credit cards was limited only by the credit on the card itself, while in the case of debit cards, it was limited to the common account to which all the associated corporate cards were charged.
Therefore, the first advantage is the individuality of each of the credit cards, which allows to adjust the expenses to be made according to the expected reality, and not vice versa, to analyze the expenses against the consummated fact of the same. This helps to better control spending, but also to better control the hands courses with the prepaid card.
Another relevant issue that gives prepaid cards an advantage as business cards is the fact of fees. A credit card, although it may contain a maintenance fee for the first year, will generally have some kind of commission, and on the other hand, the cash withdrawal on credit will be an added expense. However, with a prepaid card, this situation will not arise, since there are no issuing commissions, and there is no maintenance commission either. Therefore, in any case, the commissions will be those corresponding to cash withdrawals from the different ATMs where it is operated.
Finally, it should be taken into account that, on the company account, it will be possible to associate different personalized prepaid cards, thus facilitating the identification of the user, and the control of expenditure means working only against the deposit made, with the personal control of each of the cards individually.
Alternatives to cards: Google Pay. Today, we find ourselves in an era completely dominated by technology. That is why we will increasingly find options in the market with which to replace card payments.
Among these options is Google Pay. This is a payment method that is very convenient and simple to use, since you can make use of it from your own smartphone.
With it, it will be possible to make payments in establishments, for which we simply need to configure our credit card details. It is also possible to make transactions completely online, as well as to take advantage of services offered by Google or other applications that are compatible.
There is still a large number of users who do not trust this type of payment methods, as they believe that the level of security they have is very unreliable. Nothing could be further from the truth. The truth is that we can configure Google Pay in such a way that the security of payments is as high and effective as possible.
To begin with, the most important thing is to learn about this service. Google Pay is a platform through which it is possible to make online and physical payments from the mobile terminal itself. To do this, you must have a bank account and a Google account to which we can link.
The origin of this payment tool dates back to 2018, as a result of the union between Android Pay and Google Wallet. However, as its own name suggests, the latter would become the successor of the former. The main objective of this tool is to allow to carry out financial transactions from the smartphone itself without putting at risk the money or the private information of the user who uses it.
Making use of Google Pay, it is possible to carry out payments from the mobile itself, and even also from the smartwatch or other android device that has NFC technology. As mentioned above, it is also possible to make online payments through the Google store.
Although at first, the main idea of this tool was simply to be able to make payments via mobile, over time it has been expanding its functionalities to offer a much more optimal and satisfactory experience to its customers.
Currently it is possible to add to the tool boarding passes, coupons, or membership cards, among others, and it is even possible to synchronize the Gmail account itself. With Google Pay it is also possible to send money to other users, and eventually it is planned that the tool will even reach Ebay.
If you want to use Google Pay, it is essential to have a device that incorporates NFC technology, since without it it is not possible to make payments through the smartphone and other devices.
How the pandemic has influenced card payments. With the onset of the pandemic, users stopped making most of their payments with cash, replacing it with cards, a much more convenient method of payment that does not require any contact between the customer and the person attending the establishment.
A study carried out by the European Central Bank has found that more than half of Spanish citizens have acknowledged that they have made less use of cash since the pandemic arrived in the country. This is something that has also happened in many other countries belonging to the euro zone, such as Ireland or Belgium.
In contrast, the countries where there has been the least use of cards since the virus arrived have been: Latvia, Estonia and Malta, in which less than 25% of their citizens claimed to make regular payments with their plastics.
Of the total number of people surveyed, 38% used cash to make their payments in supermarkets. Then, 57% of those surveyed made their purchases of everyday items in small stores, and 63% made transactions in various restaurants, bars or cafeterias.
Of those who made their payments with cash, they were asked whether other types of payments were accepted in the stores where they shopped, to which more than 80% of the respondents answered that other methods were accepted, such as payment by card or even by cell phone.
The significant increase in card payments is largely due to the pandemic, as it is much less dangerous to pay with cards than to have direct contact with another person by exchanging coins and bills. However, it is also important to note that another study conducted by the ECB states that cash payments continue to be the most widely used for small day-to-day payments.
In this way, the organization itself highlights that the coronavirus pandemic has accelerated the use of cashless payment methods. There is no doubt that consumers in the euro zone increasingly prefer to make their transactions using cards, although there is still some way to go before plastic can surpass the use of cash.
In order to understand the impact that the pandemic had generated on the different payment methods, the decision was taken to complement the study carried out last year 2019, by means of a survey conducted last June of this year.
In it, 4 out of 10 respondents claim to use cash very infrequently since the outbreak of the pandemic. What was curious about the survey was that the majority of respondents said they would like to resume using cash when the pandemic ends.
The payment method that has evolved the least during these months has been payment by smartphone or smart device, since more than half of the people surveyed denied having this type of payment.
Why the CVV code is important. At a time when everything is so digitized and data theft through internet scams is something that is the order of the day, security is a key factor in all our banking operations.
Data theft through fraud through the network, is something that happens constantly every day, and unfortunately there are not few users who fall into this type of deception. From SMS that urge us to enter links, e-mails supposedly from our bank that ask us to fill in personal data or fake access pages, are just some of the most common examples of scams that users tend to fall into.
Therefore, security is a key and indisputable factor that should not be missing in absolutely any of our financial transactions, whether online or offline. In our credit cards, a method of payment increasingly used nowadays, we find various methods to avoid identity theft or any kind of vulnerability to our plastics. The one we are all undoubtedly familiar with is the security code, known as CVV.
As we all know, it is a series of numbers that we use to validate our purchases, either through the Internet or in any physical store. It is a very short code of numbers, usually no more than 3 or 4 digits, and it should be noted that it is not exclusive to credit cards, but can also be found on debit cards or even prepaid cards.
The purpose of the CVV is to increase the security level of our plastic to prevent anyone else from using the card illegally. In addition, it is important to bear in mind that we are going to find this type of code in different ways, depending on the operation we are going to perform. For example, if we pay in a physical store, we will have to enter the 3 or 4 digits in the card reader to complete the purchase. However, if we make an online purchase, normally this digit will be found on the back of the card, and it will be the last 3 numbers on the card.
The CVV is used, as we have already said, with the main objective of keeping our transaction secure, so that only we will be able to confirm it by means of the introduction of this series of digits. For example, if our credit card were to be stolen, they would not be able to complete any transaction without knowing the CVV of the card. In any case, at the slightest suspicion of theft or disappearance of our plastic cards, it is vital to go to our bank and ask for them to be blocked to prevent fraudulent transactions from being carried out with them.
Although it is not a 100% infallible security method, it is one of the most effective to avoid identity theft and, therefore, our money.
Credit card or virtual card, which is better for online shopping? In an era so dominated by technology, we can make any type of purchases through the network. But, in addition, we have multiple payment methods available, and we can choose the one that best suits our needs and personal preferences.
In fact, there are so many payment methods that there is a great lack of knowledge on the subject on the part of users, who normally tend to use only the option that seems most convenient to them without taking into account whether there are other better ones or ones that provide greater security to the operation. For example, most users tend to use their credit cards as the only option to make purchases on the Internet, without stopping to investigate whether there are much better options.
Online card payments
There is no doubt that making a payment with a card is a very simple task, which practically boils down to entering the digits of the card in the payment method to make the purchase, when in other methods you have to register or fill in much more information and it ends up being a much longer and tedious process.
Therefore, it seems to be very clear that cards are a payment element that will continue to be part of our financial operations for a long time to come. Now, to make our online purchases, we can choose between a conventional card and a virtual one. The choice depends on our needs and the level of security we want in our transactions, among other issues.
In the case of virtual cards, they have a series of pros and cons that we need to know in depth before deciding to use them. They are used exclusively for online purchases, regardless of the format in which our bank provides them. Generally, they are usually prepaid, so every time we need to make a purchase, we will have to charge the corresponding money. This is a very important pro to take into account, since the bank is the one who authorizes the movements made with this card, and in addition we only need to load it for the purchase in question, so that the rest of the time the balance remains at 0.
As for its cons, it should be noted that it works exactly like a prepaid card to use, except that in the case of the prepaid card, it offers the option of making offline payments.
Regarding credit cards, its pros and cons are as follows: one of its biggest pros is that it gives the user the opportunity to use credit, when it should not really work that way. A much more efficient way to make use of a credit card would be through the control of the payments we make, since as we know, the use of credit can generate very worrying debts for our economic stability. As for its security level, the truth is that we are much more exposed with this card than with a virtual one, since it is directly linked to our bank accounts.