Conferma, a leading FinTech company specialising in virtual card technology, and AirPlus International, a leading global provider of payment and billing solutions for business travel, today announced the expansion of their collaboration to encompass the United States.

In a recent study revealing the true cost of expense management for USA businesses, Conferma has revealed that 90% of Chief Financial Officers admit that it is difficult to reconcile corporate card payments on traditional plastic cards made by multiple members of staff. Unlike legacy payment solutions, with virtual payment every transaction has its own unique identifier, with a specific amount, user and merchant. This not only significantly reduces the risk of misuse or fraud but also removes time-consuming manual reconciliation processes.

As the focus of their joint activities, the partners are rolling out the virtual payment solution “AirPlus A.I.D.A. Virtual Cards” for the business travel market in the USA. The solution builds on AirPlus` eight-year successful partnership with Conferma across EMEA and APAC, delivering a seamless corporate payment experience while adding essential spend controls.

Crucially, AirPlus will leverage Conferma’s existing wealth of integrations in the US business travel space including all major GDS and OBTs, making it a breeze for travel management companies and their clients to manage virtual payments. AirPlus` clients will enjoy the flexibility of using their preferred booking tools, whilst gaining the advantage of enforcing their travel policies and controlling travel spend. This is great news for multinational corporations who will be able to utilize a global travel payment solution, which is consistent no matter where they are located.

Nick Reid, Commercial Manager at Conferma, said: “As fellow experts in corporate travel payments, we are excited to expand our collaboration with AirPlus to the US market, where virtual payment adoption has been growing at a pace in recent years. Although awareness of the benefits of virtual cards is rapidly increasing, the hidden costs and lack of transparency associated with non-corporate payment methods still used by many mean that virtual cards have only started to scratch the surface of the overall market opportunity.”

 “Our research has shown that travel managers find virtual card’s top benefits to be: ease of use, security and controls per card number.  With our Conferma partnership, we enable automated virtual card number generation through most GDS’s, OBT’s and many TMC’s.  This exemplifies the ease of use for A.I.D.A. Virtual Cards.  When coupled with our security features on our proprietary processing network, we have built a virtual card offering that is second to none,” explains Rebecca Kilby, President & CEO of AirPlus International Inc.