One of the fundamental best practices for a commercial card program - as for any card program - is to secure the use of the card for all eligible purchases. Increased compliance reduces procurement processing costs and reduces the time and labour required to gather spending information.
Policies must be comprehensive, with the terms readily available in detail to the users. Communication from program managers must be made regularly, so that end users feel that they have been given discretion at the point of transaction. This feeling of empowerment will increase user compliance with procurement policies.

Companies use a variety of techniques to enforce commercial card use, each according to its unique corporate culture. One broadly used method is exception reporting, where users and their managers are notified of any non-compliant spend. This reporting can be broken down by commodity or other categories, as policy requirements dictate. Some companies that participated in the Visa Procure-to-Pay Best Practices study reported using an 'escalating' system where cardholders were initially given personal notification of non-compliant behaviour. If necessary, this would be followed up at later stages by non-reimbursement of non-compliant expenses. One VISA customer has instituted a system of progressive, escalating non-compliance notifications by e-mail, culminating in card suspension after a set threshold of non-compliant purchases is reached.

Compliance, especially in large enterprises, is enhanced if there are strict controls over who is admitted to the program in the first place. This will help to reduce the later need for disciplinary actions. But the best guarantor of compliance is communication, to the users, to their supervisors, and to senior company management. Business unit managers must be kept aware of how the commercial card program is increasing the efficiency of the T&E procurement process as well as the savings the program generates. Relevant levels of management must also be kept in the loop when opportunities for program expansion are identified, so that the organization can react as quickly as possible in pursuing potential new avenues of saving.

The control of commercial card use also involves routing spend to a company's preferred suppliers in order to take better advantage of spending volumes and to fulfill the terms of negotiated agreements. By enabling spending to be consolidated more effectively and comprehensively, a commercial card program can increase the spending volumes that are directed toward preferred suppliers, increasing potential volume discounts and triggering further potential incentives such as special pricing and other negotiated arrangements as the volumes rise.

One company mandates that all T&E purchases go through its enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, which is tightly integrated with the organization's T&E procurement processes. Any T&E purchase outside this system will not be reimbursed, and as the commercial card is required to make purchases within the ERP system, card use is ensured. Another company notifies its Card Issuer when employees find a supplier that doesn't accept its issued card. The Issuer encourages the supplier to get with the program. If that doesn't work, the company itself notifies the supplier that card acceptance will be required.

The development and distribution of a company-wide T&E purchasing, or any purchasing, policy has a broad range of benefits for organizations of all sizes. It will increase compliance with preferred supplier programs, with the follow-on advantages noted earlier. It also gives individual cardholders a better understanding of what travel or purchasing restrictions are in place and why, keeps them abreast of policy updates and changes, and puts decision-making power in their hands. A purchasing policy can reduce the administrative burden borne by the procurement function and increase buy-in at the user level.

The right approach to the process of developing a company-wide purchasing policy begins with the active engagement of employees to provide insights into how the card is used every day and where improvements need to be made. A review of current policy and data on travel spending is also required to know where the most promising improvements and changes can be implemented. Buy-in and sponsorship from senior management demonstrates corporate backing across the whole organization, at all levels, helping to increase motivation and compliance. By the same token it helps to guarantee that senior managers will themselves stay interested and committed over the long term.

Commercial card policy must be disseminated as widely as possible. The process should begin with the orientation of new hires, and continue with regular e-mail and voice-mail messages, as well as the maintenance of up-to-the-minute information on a company Intranet, if available. A user-friendly format, complete with frequently asked questions (FAQs), will prevent the program from seeming complex or intimidating to end users, and will instead draw them in, making them more likely to find their own answers to questions and giving them a sense of ownership. One company that participated in the Visa Procure-to-Pay Best Practices study found that communicating T&E policy changes and updates regularly has resulted in a reduction in travel costs from $13.5 million to $9 million. Communication is kept up on an ongoing basis, and includes notification of successes, as well as traveler tips.

"The best way to increase user compliance is through communication," says one VISA customer. "I educate business unit presidents about card spending opportunities and highlight the associated savings available to the corporation as a whole. Most importantly, though, we've found that mandating card use through senior management and zero tolerance for personal card use has assured nearly full compliance."

The quantity and quality of spend data that can be incorporated into spending reports through a commercial card program has the added benefit of being available to encourage cardholder compliance. It enables program managers to keep accurate tabs on spending compliance, to correct 'maverick' buying habits, and to report program status and success to senior management. And internal competition, facilitated by detailed spending information, can be useful in fostering compliance when the success of one business unit is benchmarked against the success of others.

Ultimately, how companies communicate policies and procedures depends to a great degree on corporate culture, but participants in the Visa Procure-to-Pay Best Practices study all agreed on the need to have documented and widely disseminated spending policies and procedures, and on the need to update and review them regularly.