When to use them
By default, Spendesk users usually carry out purchases by using a Single-Use Card. However, you can (and should) use a Recurring Payments card if you are paying:
for a recurring service (i.e. a Linkedin subscription or Intercom, etc.) of one supplier at a time only,
for recurring payments for the same supplier (train tickets, hotel rooms, Apple supplies...),
if your card is meant to be charged several times by different merchants (on the same supplier's website) for the same purchase / order (ex: on marketplaces)
The danger of using 1 card for several recurring suppliers is that :
it makes it harder to track the real supplier after payment (raising fraud questions and/or a loss of time for the user and finance teams),
the card limits expire quicker, resulting in blocked services on important websites to your company, due to unpaid subscriptions for cap reached.
Therefore, we highly encourage you to create 1 card per supplier!
Technical information (lifespan, use, pause/edit/delete)
Recurring payments cards are valid for a period of 4 years from the date of first generation (=the first time you view the card's digits).
Most merchants don't ask you to add your card information every month, once should do in the majority of cases, often verified via 3DS.
They can be used several times in the month, until the monthly budget is reached.
At the beginning of each month, card budgets are reset automatically to ensure that all cards have sufficient funds according to their monthly budget.
You can edit your recurring budget at any time according to your spending needs.
You can easily pause any recurring card, reactivate it, or even remove it whenever you want. To do so, click on the card then Edit card and the option you need. Any recurring payment card you remove is permanently deleted.
Important 🚨 : If you are using a recurring card, our banking partner has applied a threshold. Above 500€, even if the merchant has requested an exemption of 3DS for recurring payments, they will be declined if the user doesn't confirm via 3DS.
Request a recurring virtual card (desktop version)
Click on New Request > Make a purchase request > Request a Virtual Card > Recurring
Fill out the request form accordingly
Don't forget to mention the monthly price (or budget) of your recurring payment. Otherwise, you can set a high budget to encompass your upcoming spending.
Your card request will be either validated automatically or by your Admin (depending on your approval policy, which is explained in your profile under your personal information).
👉 Recurring cards are valid up to 4 years and give the user the ability to make multiple payments within a given budget that they can amend independently.
If the card is created in July 2021, it's valid until July 2025.
↪️ Once your card is accepted, go to the website and copy the card's details (name, numbers, expiry date, cvv code, billing address) to the payment form, as you would with your own personal card.
🔴 Multiple payments for 1 invoice
If you edit the field below to "Yes", you have until the end of the month until missing receipts become 'missing' in your rule on receipt. This is useful in this case if supplier generates the total receipt at the end of the month and you cannot upload the receipts immediately (then have late receipts that would block your account).
Limitations of the feature: adding the receipt to 1 of the supplier's payment doesn't add it to the other payments with missing receipts. You also cannot 'group' several payments on Spendesk.
Request a recurring virtual card (mobile)
You can also request recurring cards from the mobile app. 💪
To do so,
Log in
From the Home page, select ‘+’, then ‘Request a virtual card’ and choose ‘Recurring’ then enter an amount, description and fill relevant/mandatory fields.
Send your request and wait for it to be approved (unless your approval policy is that you require ‘no approval’ or ‘sometimes’, in which case it can be automatically approved).
View subscription card details
If you have viewed the card numbers at least once, you'll find your subscription card in the Subscriptions tab.
If you haven't checked the card's details yet, you'll find the card in the Requests tab.
If you cannot find the subscription, neither in 'Requests' nor 'Commitments > Subscriptions', it means that it's been cancelled.
Edit a subscription's budget
There are several options:
ask for a budget raise in Commitments > Subscriptions > your card > Edit > Amount per period (approval might be needed).
ask for the budget to be lowered in Commitments > Subscriptions > your card > Edit > Amount per period (no approval needed).
If your card budget should have been reset and wasn't, contact support@spendesk.com.
Yearly subscriptions
For yearly subscriptions, we generally advise using a recurring payments card even if you cannot set up a yearly reload (only monthly reload available at the moment).
After paying with your recurring payments card, once the payment has been settled and appears under the "Payments" tab, you can tick the box matching your payment and select Pause to pause it. It prevents reloading the recurring payments card automatically next month and allowing new funds from your budget to go towards this subscription.
