I called Bank of America and the representative stated that she never heard of a P-Card.
What is the difference between a P-Card vs Credit Card
Answers
A P-Card is typically a purchase card issued to employees of a company to make purchases at selected businesses. The company issuing the cards can limit their use to certain SIC businesses,. i.e. a trucking firm may give drivers P-cards that can only be used at gasoline stations etc. but will not work if the driver tries to use it at department store. For the merchant who accepts these cards the interchange rate and processing fee is higher than a normal credit card. However the the card companies do a have special interchange for what is called "Large ticket transaction" . Your credit card processor should be able to give you more information on the cost and processing procedures.
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The only other thing I would add is that you can put dollar limits on the P-Card for the month and for certain transactions.
You can also limit transactions on company sponsored credit cards. When companies contract with vendors to obtain either a P-Card for purchasing of certain items or credit cards for travel and entertainment, there are blocks that are called SIC code blocks. So for instance if you don't want your employees purchasing liquor on company cards, a block can be placed on the card. You can also place dollar limits on credit cards that are used for T&E.
we have even placed dollar limits on individuals using company credit cards that have had issues turning in expense reports or have past credit issues. We now require, with few exceptions, POs for all purchases. One major exception would be travel related expenses which we capture in a separate system. Additionally normally over $5,000 would be a key for capitalizing as oppose to expensing an item.
Back in my
Companies used to get big rebates based on spending levels so they used to try and clear high dollar accounts payable items using a P-card. P-cards used to be especially valuable for manufacturing companies who ran multiple shifts and could not wait to have small dollar POs go though an approval process (and the cost of a manual PO process can be pretty steep).
For us liability is a difference. For the P-Card the Company is liable and for our T&E cards, the employee is liable.
It is surprising the BofA representative didn't know. Is he/she a business rep? That could make the difference. If you are talking to a retail rep then they may not know. BofA does have a purchasing card program, but it is housed in their corporate services area. AMEX also has one if you want to compare programs.
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