With so much emphasis on accepting credit cards and digital payment methods, the concept of the ACH payment method can easily fall off the radar of a business.
With the ACH payment method, however, there are a few key factors that make accepting them worthwhile: the versatility, cost, and multipurpose capabilities. Together, these can optimize your business’ payments processing experience in a way that has the potential to save money, increase efficiency, and draw in more customers.
Ways ACH Can Benefit Your Business
In previous blog posts, we’ve touched upon the main benefits of accepting ACH payments: Better payment reassurance, less paper, lower fees, recurring billing benefits, security, customer conversion, and convenience. But beyond the benefits alone of ACH, there are plenty of use cases your business should care about.
The ability to accept and process ACH payments is about more than just giving your customers another way to pay. Every business needing to accept payments, regardless of the type of service or product offered, can benefit from implementing ACH into their payments.
This is particularly true for nonprofit organizations and property management companies that need to get money into their accounts faster and cheaper. Or, for companies that process recurring payments and rely on subscription and membership-based services, ACH can also make managing those payments easier, cheaper and faster. The same is true for service-based merchants, like doctors, lawyers, dentists, and accountants, who need an easier way to get paid.
Why the ACH Payment Method Is Catching On
It wasn’t long ago that ACH was viewed as a clunky, antiquated way to accept payments — in large part because of the processing and settlement delays. Now, thanks to advancements in payments technology, and investments in improving how money moves across the ACH payment method, it’s back on the list of trends to follow.
Because banks, businesses, and consumers expect payments to be conducted in near real-time, there’s been a push by organizations like NACHA to make same-day ACH a reality for every single financial institution in the U.S. by the end of 2017. With banks backing this initiative, it’s paved way for businesses to take advantage of the power of the ACH payment method.
Not only are banks and businesses vying for faster ways to move money across the rails, companies like Payline are empowering businesses and organizations by providing the tools necessary to benefit from the functionality of implementing ACH into their payments.
Because ACH payments are processed through an electronic network in large batches of both credit and debit transactions, there are plenty of ways businesses can benefit from its versatility. Not to mention the peace of mind knowing your customers’ payments are being processed in a secure, encrypted environment. ACH also provides for better payment reassurance so you know how and when a payment is being processed into your account — instead of being tied up in a processing error or customer dispute.
Bottom line? ACH payment methods may not seem as “trendy” as some of the other emerging technologies today. But when it comes to offering a method with speed, security, and convenience, ACH payment methods have paved their way back into the mix of methods that businesses should care about.
Anna Kragie is a content contributor for Payline Data. She previously wrote for PYMNTS.com, as a Sr. Content Producer, where she focused on financial services and payments innovation, fraud and security, emerging payments, and FinTech news, research and thought-leadership content across the payments industry.
