Overview: This article explains how to create and use virtual credit cards to pay your suppliers from trip funds or group funds in a step-by-step manner. It also covers troubleshooting common issues and questions you may have regarding your virtual credit card.

• What is a virtual credit card?
• Creating a virtual card
• FYIs when creating virtual cards
• Using the virtual card
• Common FAQs
  • The card shows an Authorized state but my Supplier didn't receive the payment. How can I get the money back?
  • What happens when the Supplier issues a refund to the virtual card?
  • Are there any fees for using the virtual card?
  • Can I use the virtual card anywhere?

What is a virtual credit card?

Virtual credit cards are a payment option used within TravelJoy to pay your suppliers! This requires signing up for direct payment processing and collecting direct payments from your clients.

Those direct payments will be deposited into your trip or group's Funds balance, and one of the ways you can use that balance is through creating a virtual credit card that can be used to pay for trip-related expenses, much like you would use a physical credit card. 

Creating a virtual card

Once payments have deposited into your Funds balance, you can pay your Supplier with a virtual card. From the Trip or Group Funds tab, you will click the "Pay a supplier" button:

Next, you will select "Via credit card" and fill in the Supplier contact (existing or new), the payment description of what the payment is for, along with the payment amount to create your one-time use card. That amount will be pulled out of your Funds balance and applied to the card:

*If you would like to send a wire payment, see this guide for more information.

FYIs when creating virtual cards

• The amount you create the card for is the maximum that the card can be charged for. 
• The card can be used for international transactions, however, we suggest creating the card for 5% more than the expected charge amount to account for exchange rate fluctuations
  • If the transaction declined, make sure to verify how much the Supplier is charging the card for to see if you need to increase the amount the virtual card can cover, accounting for an increased exchange rate

Using the virtual card

After you have created the virtual card, you will use it just like a regular credit card, except that the card is designed to be single-use up to the maximum dollar amount you created it for.

• What happens when you use the card successfully
  • First step is authorization — the supplier has been granted access to the authorized amount
  • Second step is capture — the supplier collects the actual payment, typically 1-2 business days*
  • Once the capture is complete, any leftover money will be returned to your Funds balance

*This processing time can vary depending on the Supplier. If your payment has not been captured after 1-2 business days, please follow up with your Supplier.

The virtual card will first show in the Funds transactions in a READY status. This means that the card is ready to use to pay the Supplier, and it has not yet been used to submit payment. When you are ready to submit the payment to the Supplier, you will click on the credit card icon displayed next to the READY status to view the card information*:

*Clicking the credit card icon is also where you can cancel the virtual card if needed

Once you submit this payment to the Supplier, the card will go into an AUTHORIZED state and you will no longer be able to view the card information as this is a one-time-use virtual card:

After the Supplier has collected the payment, the card will go into a PAID state:

Common FAQs

The card shows an Authorized state but my Supplier didn't receive the payment. How can I get the money back?

Credit card transactions begin with the merchant asking for permission to charge a card (known as authorization) and the card issuer approving or rejecting this request. Approval means that the merchant has permission to capture that payment within a specific time frame. 

This permission can only be reversed by the merchant. They can do this by submitting an "authorization reversal" request with their payment processor, who will then submit a message to the card issuer.

If the merchant and their payment processor do not successfully reverse the authorization, the hold will remain active until automatic expiration, which takes between 7 and 60 days. 

What happens when the Supplier issues a refund to the virtual card?

The refund will automatically go back into the Funds balance and be listed in the Funds report. After the payment is returned, you can:

• Create a new payment to a Supplier
• Withdraw the funds to your bank account
• Refund a client on their invoice from the Funds balance. (See this guide for instructions on how to do this)

Are there any fees for using the virtual card? 

No — processing fees only apply to collecting payments from your clients, not sending payments to suppliers. See this guide for more information on where fees apply in TravelJoy. 

Can I use the virtual card anywhere?

To ensure compliance with Seller of Travel regulations and meet risk management obligations, TravelJoy initially limits virtual credit cards to certain merchant categories related to the travel industry. These merchant categories are used by the card industry to classify each purchase.

If your credit card transaction falls outside of these merchant categories, the transaction will be declined, and you will receive an email from TravelJoy a short time later with further instructions. Reply to that message with a quick description of the transaction and how it relates to the trip or group, and we will work to get the merchant approved so that you can retry the transaction. 

If you are not sure why your credit card is being declined, and you haven't received a message about this via email, please reach out to the support team via email or chat and we will look into it.