How PingPong and Visa’s partnership is reshaping enterprise global payment processes

How PingPong and Visa’s Partnership Is Reshaping Global Corporate Payment Workflows

In the global corporate payments landscape, the biggest friction often does not come from the willingness to pay, but from the mismatch between payment methods and suppliers’ acceptance capabilities. PingPong recently partnered with Visa to launch the Card to Account Payment Solution, aiming to solve this long-standing B2B payment pain point: companies can continue using their existing commercial credit cards to make payments, while suppliers do not need to accept card payments and can still receive funds via standard bank transfers. For finance teams spread across different markets and systems, this “card-side payment, account-side receipt” model represents a pragmatic upgrade to digital payment infrastructure.

The solution is mainly aimed at finance teams in mid-sized and large enterprises, with a focus on cross-border supplier payments, working capital management, and the automation of corporate finance processes. It is not creating a brand-new payment use case, but rather trying to patch the most time-consuming and common break in the corporate payment chain: commercial cards offer deferred payment and cash flow management advantages, but many suppliers, especially in the UK and EU markets, do not accept card payments. PingPong’s new solution is designed precisely within this real-world constraint to give enterprises a more flexible payment path.

Industry Background

Corporate payments have long featured two parallel but not fully compatible infrastructures: one is the commercial card network, and the other is the bank transfer and traditional account-based payment system. Commercial cards are often viewed as working capital tools, because enterprises can settle after the billing date, thereby extending cash retention time; but in actual procurement and supplier payments, many suppliers are more accustomed to receiving bank transfers rather than card payments. As a result, companies may hold a “more flexible” payment tool, yet still be unable to truly use it in most supplier scenarios.

This issue is even more pronounced in cross-border payments. Different countries’ payment habits, clearing rules, currencies, and compliance requirements all add complexity to corporate financial operations. For enterprises that need to manage suppliers across multiple countries, multiple currencies, and staggered settlement cycles, payment efficiency is not only about operating costs, but also about cash flow security and supply chain stability. That is why embedded finance, payment infrastructure, and real-time settlement capabilities have become major development directions in fintech in recent years.

PingPong’s approach belongs to banking and payment innovation centered on infrastructure. It does not emphasize the consumer-facing experience, but instead embeds directly into enterprise finance workflows, reducing friction such as supplier onboarding, manual reconciliation, and switching between multiple systems. Such capabilities are especially important for enterprises advancing digital banking and financial automation.

Current DevelopmentsAccording to public information, PingPong’s partnership with Visa enables its Card to Account Payment Solution to cover more than 170 countries and over 25 currencies, with settlement speeds ranging from same-day settlement to T+2. For corporate finance teams, this level of coverage means the solution is suitable not only for local procurement, but also for cross-border supplier payment scenarios.

One notable feature is that the solution does not require suppliers to complete additional onboarding. Suppliers continue to receive funds through standard bank transfers, following their existing habits; the change happens on the payment side, where companies can pay using their existing commercial credit cards. This design lowers the barrier to network effects and also reduces the coordination costs often seen when introducing new payment methods across the supply chain.

From a deployment perspective, the solution can be used either through PingPong’s web portal or embedded into enterprise ERP systems and treasury management platforms via API. This is especially important for large enterprises, because once payment workflows are embedded into core financial systems, they can more easily be linked with approval, budget control, reconciliation, and audit processes, creating a more complete financial automation framework.

Lucy Demery, Visa’s Head of Commercial Solutions Europe, said that such partnerships are extending the value of commercial card rails beyond traditional acceptance scenarios, improving payment security and enhancing working capital management for both buyers and sellers. David Messenger, CEO of PingPong’s international business, described the product as an extension of its embedded financial infrastructure, emphasizing its practical use cases in global commercial payments.

Impact on the Financial System

The core value of this kind of solution lies in improving payment efficiency and enhancing corporate liquidity management. For corporate buyers, paying with a commercial credit card means cash outflows can be delayed, with reports indicating a delay of more than 45 days. Compared with direct bank transfers, this gives companies a larger working capital buffer, which is especially meaningful in periods of macroeconomic uncertainty and high financing costs.

For suppliers, the biggest change is not the way they receive payment, but the certainty of receipt and the stability of the process. Since funds still ultimately arrive via bank transfer, suppliers do not need to change their existing collection habits, nor do they bear additional operational burdens from accepting card payments. This model reduces friction in payment innovation and helps improve transaction success rates without changing end-user habits.For banks and payment institutions, this model reflects how cross-border payments are shifting from a single “account-to-account” logic toward an infrastructure structure of “multi-rail coordination.” Commercial card networks, acquiring capabilities, account settlement, and API orchestration together form a new payment layer. For payment infrastructure providers, the one that can better integrate these rails will have a greater chance of gaining sustained advantages in the enterprise fintech space.

From a regulatory perspective, Visa’s involvement also shows that enterprise-grade payment products increasingly need to be built on compliance, capital backing, and global coverage capabilities. For regulators, the focus usually is not just on whether new payment methods are supported, but also on the transparency of fund flows, anti-money-laundering controls, data governance, and operational resilience in cross-border payments. As financial regulation continues to evolve, platforms that can build compliance design into the product structure from the outset are more likely to gain both market and regulatory recognition.

Challenges Ahead

Although this model has a clear business logic, it does not eliminate all the obstacles in enterprise payments.

First is the issue of technical integration. For large enterprises already running complex ERP, procurement, and treasury systems, any new payment capability must be deeply compatible with approval workflows, account management, and financial accounting. If system integration is insufficient, enterprises may still fall back on manual processes, weakening the advantages of the solution.

Second is data privacy and cybersecurity. Enterprise payments involve sensitive financial data, counterparty information, and cross-border fund flows, and any security flaws related to APIs or portals could magnify risks. As payments become more digital, security and compliance costs will rise accordingly.

Third is regulatory uncertainty. Cross-border payments and commercial card scenarios both involve rules across multiple jurisdictions, and different markets have inconsistent requirements for fund settlement, card scheme rules, supplier collections, and tax handling. For infrastructure providers like PingPong, which cover multiple countries and currencies, how to maintain consistent compliance standards during expansion is part of long-term operational capability.

Finally, there is the issue of market acceptance. Although this solution does not require additional supplier onboarding, whether enterprises are willing to change existing payment workflows still depends on their overall judgment of efficiency, cost, and internal controls. In other words, this model solves the issue of “availability,” but whether it can scale still depends on whether enterprise finance organizations are willing to restructure their processes.

Future OutlookOver the next three to five years, this kind of card-to-account, account orchestration, and embedded payment model may become an important component of enterprise cross-border payment infrastructure. The reason is that enterprises do not just need “faster payments”; they need to improve their cash flow management while keeping the supplier experience unchanged. Fintech solutions that can satisfy both of these needs are usually more likely to be adopted into real financial workflows.

As real-time payments, open banking, and embedded finance continue to develop, enterprise payment infrastructure will depend less and less on a single channel and will instead move toward a scenario-centered, multi-rail parallel architecture. Commercial cards will no longer serve only traditional procurement, but will be used more to extend working capital; account-based payments will no longer be just “transfers,” but will become one part of ERP, procurement, and payment approval processes.

For regulators, the future focus may be on cross-border transparency, data governance, and operational resilience. As digital payments and financial technology penetrate deeper into core enterprise systems, regulatory frameworks will also place greater emphasis on funds flow tracing, consumer and business protection, and the stability of supply chain payments.

Overall, the partnership between PingPong and Visa is not just a product launch, but also reflects the structural changes taking place in the enterprise payments market: the value of payment tools will no longer be judged solely by whether a single transaction is completed, but by whether they can help companies manage liquidity more efficiently, connect with suppliers with less friction, and operate global financial networks more securely.