Create cards

Learn how to create and activate cards.

After you create an account holder and a balance account, you can start issuing cards. Cards can either be virtual or physical. Cards also have to be associated with a Visa or Mastercard pre-approved use case, called a scheme program. By default, Adyen handles the scheme program for you in the background.

To issue a card, you'll need to create a paymentInstrument resource.

PCI compliance

The scope for PCI compliance depends on your use case—the type of cards you'll issue and how the cards will be used. To know whether PCI compliance requirements apply to your use case, reach out to your Adyen contact.

Visual design for physical cards

Before you start creating physical cards in the live environment, you will need to create a visual design for your cards and for the mailer the card is sent in. Each card design has to be approved by Visa or Mastercard.

Your Adyen contact will help you in completing your card design during the implementation.

Create a card

To issue a card, create a paymentInstrument resource. When making an API request, you set the card form factor to either physical or virtual. The other parameters that you need to include depend on the card form factor.

Virtual
Physical

A virtual card is a card that has no physical form, and can only be used online. You receive the card details in the API response.

To create a virtual card, make a POST /paymentInstruments request specifying:

Parameter	Required	Description
type		Set to card.
balanceAccountId		The balance account ID that should be associated with the card. You can still update the balance account associated with a card at later time as long as the card `status` is Requested or Inactive.
card		Object that contains card configuration such as: The card formFactor, set to virtual. The cardholderName to be shown on the card. The card brand. The card brandVariant.
status		By default, cards are created with an Active status but depending on your use case, you might also want to set the status to Requested or Inactive.

In your request, you can also include optional parameters such as a human-readable description to help your staff differentiate between multiple cards under one balance account.

Here is how you would create a virtual card linked to a balance account with id BA1234123412341234:

https://docs.adyen.com/issuing/create-cards#create-card-virtual-request

Create a virtual card

curl https://balanceplatform-api-test.adyen.com/bcl/v1/paymentInstruments \
-u "ws@BalancePlatform.YOUR_BALANCE_PLATFORM":"YOUR_WS_PASSWORD" \
-H "content-type: application/json" \
-d '{
    "type": "card",
    "description": "{hint:Your human-readable description for this card}S.Hopper - Main card{/hint}",
    "balanceAccountId": "BA1234123412341234",
    "issuingCountryCode": "NL",
    "card": {
      "cardholderName": "Sam Hopper",
      "brand": "mc",
      "brandVariant": "mcdebit",
      "formFactor": "virtual"
    }
}'

The response returns the paymentInstrument resource, identified by its unique id.

https://docs.adyen.com/issuing/create-cards#create-card-virtual-response

Response

{
    "balanceAccountId": "BA1234123412341234",
    "description": "S.Hopper - Main card",
    "issuingCountryCode": "NL",
    "status": "Active",
    "type": "card",
    "card": {
        "brand": "mc",
        "brandVariant": "mcdebit",
        "cardholderName": "Sam Hopper",
        "formFactor": "virtual",
        "bin": "555544",
        "cvc": "686",
        "expiration": {
            "month": "07",
            "year": "2023"
        },
        "lastFour": "2787",
        "number": "5555444400092787"
    },
    "id": "PI3227C223222B5BPCMFXD2XG"
}

A physical card is printed and shipped to the cardholder. You do not receive the card details in the API response. Sending a request to create a physical card also starts an order.

When creating a physical card, you'll need to include additional information such as the card manufacturing profile and the delivery details in your API request.

To create a physical card, make a POST /paymentInstruments request specifying:

Parameter	Required	Description
type		Set to card.
balanceAccountId		The balance account ID that should be associated with the card. You can still update the balance account associated with a card at later time as long as the card `status` is Requested or Inactive.
card		Object that contains card configuration such as: The card formFactor, set to physical. The cardholderName to be shown on the card. The card brand. The card brandVariant. The deliveryContact details.
configuration		Object that contains settings for the physical card, including design and the configurationProfileId.
status		By default, cards are created with an Active status but depending on your use case, you might also want to set the status to Requested or Inactive if you don't want to ship an active card to your user.

In your request, you can also include optional parameters such as a human-readable description to help your staff differentiate between multiple cards under one balance account.

Here is how you would create a physical card linked to a balance account with id BA1234123412341234. In this example, we'll create a card with an Inactive status.

https://docs.adyen.com/issuing/create-cards#create-card-physical-request

Create a physical card

curl https://balanceplatform-api-test.adyen.com/bcl/v1/paymentInstruments \
-u "ws@BalancePlatform.YOUR_BALANCE_PLATFORM":"YOUR_WS_PASSWORD" \
-H "content-type: application/json" \
-d '{
  "type": "card",
  "issuingCountryCode": "NL",
  "balanceAccountId": "BA1234123412341234",
  "status": "Inactive",
  "card": {
    "formFactor": "physical",
    "brand": "mc",
    "brandVariant": "mcdebit",
    "cardholderName": "Sam Hopper",
    "deliveryContact": {
      "address": {
        "city": "Amsterdam",
        "country": "NL",
        "stateOrProvince": "NH",
        "street": "274 Brannan Street, Suite 600",
        "houseNumberOrName": "50",
        "postalCode": "1020CD"
      },
      "name": {
        "firstName": "Sam",
        "lastName": "Hopper"
      }
    },
    "configuration": {
      "configurationProfileId": "YOUR_CONFIGURATION_PROFILE_ID"
    },
    "expiry": {
      "month": 8,
      "year": 2024
    }
  },
  "description": "{hint:Your human-readable description for this card}S.Hopper - Main card{/hint}"
}'

The response returns the paymentInstrument resource, identified by its unique id.

https://docs.adyen.com/issuing/create-cards#create-card-virtual-response

Response

{
  "balanceAccountId": "BA1234123412341234",
  "description": "S.Hopper - Main card",
  "issuingCountryCode": "NL",
  "status": "Inactive",
  "type": "card",
  "card": {
    "brand": "mc",
    "brandVariant": "mcdebit",
    "cardholderName": "Sam Hopper",
    "configuration": {
      "configurationProfileId": "YOUR_CONFIGURATION_PROFILE_ID"
    },
    "formFactor": "physical",
    "bin":"555544",
    "expiration":{
      "month":"08",
      "year":"2023"
    },
    "lastFour":"1589"
  },
  "id": "PI3227C223222B5BPCMFXD2XG"
}

In the test environment, you will not receive physical test cards.

Before you start creating live physical cards, you will need to create a visual design for your cards and the mailer the card is sent in. Reach out to your Adyen contact to specify the design and mailing collateral you want to send.

Multiple cardholders under one balance account

This use case is only allowed in specific circumstances. Check with your Adyen contact if this is a functionality you can use.

Some business cases might require having multiple cardholders under one balance account, but only the account holder will go through the KYC process. For example:

Creating named cards for multiple employees in one company.
Creating additional cards for a spouse or children.

After the main account holder completes the KYC process, you can start creating cards for additional cardholders.

To do this, make another POST /paymentInstruments request.

Here is how you would create another virtual card linked to same balance account BA1234123412341234 for a different cardholder:

https://docs.adyen.com/issuing/create-cards#create-add-virtual-request

Create additional cards

{
  "type": "card",
  "description": "{hint:Your human-readable description for this card}Supplementary card{/hint}",
  "balanceAccountId": "BA1234123412341234",
  "issuingCountryCode": "NL",
  "card": {
    "cardholderName": "Jean Hopper",
    "brand": "{hint:Card scheme: mc or visa}mc{/hint}",
    "brandVariant": "mcdebit",
     "formFactor": "virtual"
  }
}

Activate a card

For physical cards, we recommend keeping cards inactive until your user receives the card. When the user receives the card, the card can be activated.

To make a card active, make a PATCH /paymentInstruments/{id} request and update the status to Active.

Here is an example updating the status for payment instrument with id PI3227C223222B5BPCMFXD2XG.

https://docs.adyen.com/issuing/create-cards#update-card-request

Activate card

curl https://balanceplatform-api-test.adyen.com/bcl/v1/paymentInstruments/PI3227C223222B5BPCMFXD2XG \
-u "ws@BalancePlatform.YOUR_BALANCE_PLATFORM":"YOUR_WS_PASSWORD" \
-H "content-type: application/json" \
-X PATCH \
-d '{
    "status":"Active"
}'

Next steps

Before your users can start making purchases with the newly issued card, you will have to choose how to fund the accounts, process payments, and manage the card lifecycle.

required

Process payments

Choose how to authorise card payments.

required

Manage funds

Choose how to allocate funds to balance accounts.

required

Manage cards

Learn how to replace or cancel a card.