Our Zero Data Hero Customer Spotlight series highlights the stories of VGS customers who have joined our Zero Data mission to protect the world’s information.
TravelBank’s innovative, all-in-one trip expense platform - protected by VGS
Q - Tell us about TravelBank?
Reid - TravelBank is a modern travel and expense platform that allows businesses to book business trips, get in touch with 24/7 travel support, track expenses, and process reimbursements all in one app. Using an intelligent algorithm, TravelBank predicts travel costs based on real-time pricing. Users can access a curated bookings platform with special exclusive rates. TravelBank offers a camera-first experience for tracking expenses on-the-go, and rewards for employees who save money on corporate travel when they choose more cost-effective options.
Q - How did TravelBank approach the challenge of data security?
Reid - When we started the company, we knew we needed to utilize sensitive information in non-traditional ways. For example, when you work with some credit card processors, they reduce your PCI scope by letting data in, but not out - so that only they have access to process payments. This works to reduce your PCI scope, but results in data lock-in. In our travel payments infrastructure, it was a requirement that we be able to move payments data around with some of our fulfillment partners in a myriad of ways, which made VGS the logical choice to solve the problem of reducing scope as well as giving us the flexibility to use the payment information as needed. In addition, we treat all of our customer's data like it was our own and we knew that we needed to make sure that we were protecting that information - especially as it relates to travel.
Q - What does Zero Data mean to you?
Reid - Zero Data, to us, means not holding onto the information that may put you in scope for compliance efforts. This also highly reduces our risk.
Q - How has VGS helped TravelBank?
Reid - VGS has been a great partner since the beginning, and has provided an invaluable service with essentially no downtime - which is especially important considering that every payment request must go through VGS.
Q - How do you quantify the benefit of VGS?
Reid - The benefit is very easy to quantify - the choice is between putting together a compliant and secure infrastructure with numerous staff members across various disciplines, versus a (literally) 3 line implementation.
Q - Any advice for other startups who are beginning their PCI journey?
Reid - Focus on what matters, and find shortcuts where possible to speed you up towards getting your customers to value - if something exists for a solution, there's no need to reinvent the wheel.
Q - Who is your favorite superhero and why?
Reid - Leonardo from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - he's their leader and serves as a great role model for the rest of the group, while being disciplined and highly skilled.
Q - How can people sign up with TravelBank?
Reid - TravelBank is available for anyone to use for free on desktop, iOS, and Android. Setting up your company on TravelBank takes minutes, not months like other solutions. We make it simple for you to invite users and assign them to a team or manager role with one tap. We provide recommended settings for features like travel policy, budgets, and rewards so you can turn them on and get started right away, and if you choose to, customizing these features is simple and streamlined within your company settings page. And our customer support team is always available to help at any point along the way.
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Ena Kadribasic 
