Andavo Payments: The virtual solution to travel spend headaches

Corporate travel programs today face two persistent headaches: fraud riskand reconciliation burdens. As travel spending accelerates across industries,these challenges are becoming harder for finance and travel teams to ignore.

Christopherson has responded with Andavo Payments, a single‑use virtualcard solution designed to secure transactions, streamline reconciliation, andimprove real‑time visibility into travel spend.

The persistent problem: Fraud in corporate travel

Fraud is not just a theoretical risk—it’s a daily concern for travel programs.

“Over 80% of organizations experienced attempted payment fraud just in the last year,” said Matt Cameron, chief consulting officer at Christopherson.

Hotels are a primary point of vulnerability.

“Hotels drive one-third of all credit card fraud cases,” Cameron noted, highlighting the unique exposure in a card‑not‑present industry.

The rise of artificial intelligence has only heightened the stakes.

“Hackers and attackers have increased their attacks by over 400% using these new AI tools,” Cameron explained. “They’re using deepfake voice and videos and sounding like they're actually someone in your organization.”

The good news? AI is also being used on the defensive side.

“The good guys are using the same technology to fight these trends,” Cameron said.

He pointed to Mastercard and Visa initiatives in real‑time data sharing, which have reduced the average time to remediate a breach by more than 100 days.

The hidden cost: Manual reconciliation

While fraud is the most visible threat, manual reconciliation quietly drains time and money every month.

“Eighty‑three percent of finance teams spend several days reconciling at the end of the month,” Matt Cameron said.

This process not only consumes staff hours but also delays financial visibility—often by 30 to 60 days—limiting the ability to make timely decisions.

Josh Cameron, chief operating officer, added: “In that visibility gap, there's hard costs for sure, but it's a value lost in making better decisions quicker.”

Beyond costs, delayed reconciliation can strain relationships between finance and travel managers. Mismatched or incomplete data often triggers follow‑up questions, more emails, and administrative churn.

Why multi‑use cards aren’t enough

For decades, corporate travel programs have leaned on multi‑use virtual cards (ghost cards, lodge cards, or central travel accounts). These consolidate spend, but their limitations are clear.

“The second you swipe a multi‑use card, you’ve separated all of that rich data that’s unique to that booking from the transaction that’s going to comeback and settle from the vendor,” Josh Cameron said. “And then you spend the rest of the time trying to reconcile that.”

Multi‑use cards can still be effective for certain use cases, but in today’s environment of fraud sophistication and demand for real‑time data, they aren’t the complete solution.

Single‑use virtual cards: A smarter, more secure approach

Enter single‑use virtual cards—a technology designed with direct feedback from travel managers.

“The single‑use virtual card was really designed with a lot of feedback from the travel industry and travel managers who identified those areas of reconciliation pain,” said Paul Foster, strategic consultant at Christopoherson.

These cards are created for a single, specific transaction—such as a hotel stay or airline ticket—and are tied directly to the booking data.

Josh Cameron explained the impact in simple terms: “It’s permanently reconciled with all of your attributes or units, anything that's interesting to your business. All of that is permanently reconciled from the very start. And you skip travel reconciliation.”

By embedding detailed booking information directly into the payment record, the transaction stays matched forever—eliminating the need for manual reconciliation.

Introducing Andavo Payments

Christopherson’s Andavo Payments takes the single‑use card model and integrates it into a secure, cloud‑based travel management environment.

When a booking is made, Andavo Payments automatically issues a single‑use virtual card tied to that specific reservation. The system embeds the traveler’s details, vendor information, trip dates, and expense coding into the card, ensuring permanent, error‑free matching.

Josh Cameron summarized the platform’s role: “The Andavo platform becomes the consolidated place to manage all of the data regarding your travel program. Not just bookings, not just transactions, not just reports, but payments and anything else that is a core part of what you guys do in the travel management process.”

Beyond fraud protection: Real‑time visibility and ERP integration

With Andavo Payments, finance teams gain immediate visibility into travel spending.

“We're going to actually be able to show you settled card data tied explicitly back to that booking data with no effort,” Josh Cameron said.

The platform also supports ERP integration, allowing expense data to flow seamlessly into financial systems for live reporting. Over time, this connection will reduce manual entry and accelerate month‑end closing cycles.

Automation that saves hours—and headaches

In addition to eliminating reconciliation, Andavo Payments automates receipt matching.

Josh Cameron noted: “Upwards of the 98th, 99th percentile of matching [is achieved] with no effort from your teams.”

This automation frees finance and travel managers from the manual, repetitive work of tracking receipts and coding transactions—letting them focus on higher‑value strategic activities.

Built on proven rails, enhanced by Christopherson innovation

While Andavo Payments uses established industry infrastructure from partners like Conferma and major banking networks, Christopherson has added proprietary technology within the Andavo Platform to unify payments, booking, and reporting.

“We’re using the best‑in‑class rails and building a bunch of custom tech and solutions on top of it,” Josh Cameron explained.

The result is a single hub for managing all aspects of corporate travel finance—from fraud prevention to reconciliation to live spend insights.

The bottom line: Control, security, and efficiency

Fraud is rising. Manual reconciliation is costly. Data gaps slow decision‑making.

Andavo Payments offers a secure, automated, and intelligent virtual payment system that keeps travel and finance teams in control. By embedding booking details directly into each transaction and enabling real‑time visibility, the platform eliminates reconciliation burdens, strengthens fraud protection, and delivers the clarity organizations need to make smarter decisions—faster.

As corporate travel continues to evolve, Andavo Payments positions Christopherson clients to navigate the future of travel finance with confidence.

Want to learn more? Request a demo today.

‍

► You’ll also like: The Andavo traveler app: Business travel, fully connected