Visa to pilot launch AR Manager for virtual cards

This solution, which will be available for limited pilot in November, reinforces Visa’s commitment to delivering a seamless digital payment experience for issuers and suppliers alike - and it further expands offerings designed to support the commercial B2B community.

Businesses have rapidly turned to virtual cards as the preferred method for processing accounts payable - and the value is clear: a recent study from the Institute of Commercial Payments found that 84% of commercial merchants cited getting paid more quickly as a key reason for utilizing virtual cards as a preferred acceptance mechanism1. Today, however, virtual card acceptance can be an incredibly manual, time-consuming and costly process - potentially occurring dozens of times each day and often with different protocols for each bank a merchant is receiving payments from.

Visa AR Manager will address this merchant pain-point directly, automating the virtual card transaction process by retrieving card account details, initiating the authorization and clearing steps on the supplier’s behalf, and then providing meaningful and timely reconciliation data to close out invoices in the supplier’s Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system.

“This innovation is a direct result of deep, meaningful conversations with our valued partners and customers, who have highlighted the friction they experience today with virtual card transaction processing,” said Abhishek, Global Head of B2B Acceptance at Visa Commercial Solutions. “Visa AR Manager will enable us to create an optimal transaction experience for our commercial customers, automating an antiquated process and transforming the way they work.”

Visa AR Manager will be available for pilot customer onboarding beginning in November, with availability expanding more broadly into the new year. It supplements the deep, strategic partnerships that Visa has in place today to continue innovating around merchant friction with commercial payment acceptance.