Business credit cards can be one of the easiest ways for a new business to get the money it needs. They are also a great way for established businesses to ease the transition into the Internet age by making it easier for employees to track their travel and business expenses. But a good business credit card has a number of other benefits that companies can use to improve their financial stability and customer service even more. These include rewards programmes, variable credit limits, and multiple cards with fixed limits for employees with different needs.
Most business credit card rewards programmes offer frequent flyer miles, cash back for gas and other travel costs, and sometimes even office supplies or building materials. This makes business credit cards great for almost any kind of business. For example, investment firms can save money on the constant flights and travel they need to do to get to meetings in faraway places. Also, you can save money on simple things like paper, toner, binder clips, and other office supplies that any good corporate office needs to keep running. But with the right kind of business credit card, even a small construction, landscaping, or delivery company can cut a big chunk out of their monthly gas or material costs. Cash back on purchases is usually between 1% and 3%, which isn't very good. But if your business uses up all of its $10,000 credit limit in one month and gets a $300 rebate check during that same month, those savings can add up to a lot over time.
A good business credit card also has credit limits that can change. No matter how good their business plans are, startup companies often don't know exactly how much money they'll need in a given month. In some industries, like travel and tourism, business tends to be seasonal. At times, a credit limit of $15,000 might be useful, but during the off-season, you might only have $7,500 in expenses that need to be paid on credit. With a variable credit limit, you can spend as much or as little as you want in a given month, as long as you can pay the interest. Variable credit limits do come with a monthly fee, but since the average monthly fee is around $100, this should be an easy business expense to handle. It's also a simple way to use business credit cards to make your accounting and operations run more smoothly.
Lastly, business credit cards often let you use more than one card on a single account. Each card has its own credit limit. This lets you give only certain trusted employees a certain amount of buying power. It's a great way to keep track of your company's buying and travel costs without giving every employee the same access to a single, high-limit credit account. Even though you should always make sure that your employees can be responsible for their own credit limits (since, for startup businesses, a business credit card is usually put in the name of an individual cardholder instead of the business), business credit cards can help make your employees more independent, which can lead to a better work environment and less time spent on tedious financial arrangements and year-end accounting crunches.
There are more benefits to business credit cards, but any employer who wants to do business in a world of frequent travel and online shopping should find these three features helpful. Any kind of business, from a three-person mechanic shop to a multinational conglomerate, can be hard to run. However, if your employees have a good business credit card, some of the hardest things about running a business become easier.
