“Accounting departments feel comfortable with the idea of ​​transforming processes that have hardly been changed in years,†says Craig o’neill, CEO of Versapay. In “The way payments are now madeO’Neill explores how his company is seeing increased adoption of digitalization and AR automation among its customers, and how this is changing the way people on both sides of a B2B transaction interact.
Over the past year, we’ve seen that when the pressure is on, businesses will embrace change much faster than we thought. The experience with B2B payments, and in particular the accounts receivable (AR) function – which until recently was steeped in manual and paper-based processes – is a particularly compelling example.
I think back to a survey last fall, when most businesses (seven out of 10) were just starting to think about digitizing their AR. When you compare that to more recent information from last spring, that timeline has accelerated significantly – 93% of companies now say they are already implementing AR and Accounts Payable (AP) technologies.
Accounting departments feel at ease with the idea of ​​transforming processes that have remained largely untouched in years. Beyond that, they are now clamoring to do it. They expect the improvements they make to payments and AR to catalyze and energize their customer experiences and accelerate cash flow. And they had no choice but to do so, with teams spread across multiple geographies and COVID-19 restrictions forcing them to critically review their normal payment routines.
Among our customers, we see a thirst for increased collaboration between their AR departments and their customers. The main causes of late payments can be attributed to a lack of access to information for both clients and accounting staff. When customers struggle to find answers to simple questions like how much they owe, they have no choice but to contact their vendor’s AR department through stale channels.
Telephone and email are not suitable for providing quick answers, but what else can they do? Companies that have embraced the digitization of accounting with the customer experience in mind have been able to bypass traditional payment delays by removing information barriers that typically lead to litigation and billing discrepancies.
By using an AR automation platform that promotes direct communication between AR representatives and customers in the cloud, forward-thinking companies have been able to eradicate the payment problems that have plagued them for decades.
At Versapay, we’re seeing a growing adoption of the digitization and automation of augmented reality, but it’s happening in a way that is reinventing the way people on both sides of a B2B transaction interact. Self-service customer payment portals are heavily influencing these changes – not surprisingly, especially since many businesses operate outside of a traditional 9 to 5 business day limits due to the nature of the business. of their sector. Our clients involved in construction, for example, need to allow their clients to make payments and access their account details anytime, anywhere.
With Versapay, these customers receive payments from contractors around the clock, whether they are at home or on a rooftop. Versapay eases the transition to a more collaborative model for B2B payments by going beyond automation and connecting AR departments with their customers through the cloud. This translates into dramatically improved efficiencies, accelerated cash flow, and a streamlined, unmatched payment experience.
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NEW PYMNTS DATA: DIGITAL BANKING STUDY – THE BATTLE OF BREWING FOR WHERE WE WILL BANK
On: Forty-seven percent of U.S. consumers avoid digital-only banks due to data security concerns, despite considerable interest in these services. In Digital Banking: The Brewing Battle For Where We Will Bank, PYMNTS surveyed over 2,200 consumers to reveal how digital-only banks can boost privacy and security while providing convenient services to meet this unmet demand.
