7 Reasons Why Your Business Should Start Accepting Electronic Payments

A recent study found that the majority of young adults feel increasingly ‘very confident’ about using online technology to make purchases.

Let’s be real. The way we all manage money is changing, and if you run a business your payment structure should reflect that. If you’re stuck in old times with how you accept payment, it’s time to step up into the 21st century.

Let’s get into the numerous benefits of electronic payments.

Convenience

Tired of dealing with standard paper invoicing, paper checks, and countless trips to the local bank? If so, you need to get on board with electronic payments.

It’s undoubtedly convenient for both you and your customers. They don’t have to worry about carrying paper checks (or cash), and you don’t have to manage all that paper or extraneous errands.

Best of all? You tend to receive the money faster, as it transfers automatically to your account.

Get Paid (And Get Paid Faster)

As mentioned, you’ll tend to receive your money faster if you set up electronic payments.

Let’s take a moment to talk about credit card processing. If you use a credit card for regular spending, how many times have you had to call in to dispute a charge? Or call your bank to ensure that payment goes through?

As you can see, there are many reasons why credit cards can be disputed.

ACH transactions can only be disputed for a few reasons. Financial institutions can dispute ACH transactions if the amount is listed differently than authorized, if you attempt to process it earlier than the authorized date, or if it is isn’t authorized at all.

Furthermore, you’ll find out instantly if the payment doesn’t go through. This contrasts to credit cards, where banks can tie up funds for several weeks to pinpoint the problem.

Lower Transaction Fees

In general, ACH transactions typically have the lowest fees of any payment method outside of direct cold, hard cash.

Let’s break down a $500 transaction cost. You can expect to pay about 50 cents for an ACH transaction, $1.20 for a paper check, and up to $10 for a credit card due to the tax and transaction fees.

Over the long-term and throughout your business scaling, you can see how these incremental fees add up!

Environmentally Friendly

This may not seem like the biggest factor, but we’re all trying to make this planet a bit greener, aren’t we? In fact, a recent study shows that young people value the environment even more than money.

By eliminating or reducing paper checks, you save on paper. And it’s not just about checks. We’re talking about other paper receipts, stamps, envelopes, gasoline costs.

Not only can you save a few extra dollars here and there, but you can also be more conscious of how you treat our environment. This can benefit both you and your customers.

Increased Security

Worried about identity theft? You should be. In fact, in 2017, 1 in 15 people were victims of such fraud.

If you’re worried, you better imagine how your customers must feel loosely handing out their secure information. For this reason, some of this won’t want to provide you with account numbers over the phone or through the mail. Some of them won’t want to walk around haphazardly with checks in their wallets.

Who can blame them? It’s a risky time to be a consumer, and we’re all told to practice financial security when making payments.

However, by setting up an ACH payment, both you and your customers can rest assured knowing that the process entails inputting sensitive data into an encrypted and secure system.

Unlike a paper check, it doesn’t have the same risk of being managed across multiple hands or being left in an unsecured area.

And we all know that cash isn’t very secure by now, don’t we?

Enhanced Efficiency

When you choose to allow electronic payments, it’s simple and straightforward to create auto payments and recurring billing.

Rather than manually calculate and invoice your customers, you can create automatic bills. As you can see, this can save you an extraordinary amount of time, especially if you work with many clients. It can also save you the hassle of needing to organize and remember all the payments and their subsequent schedules.

Think about what you can do with all that extra time reinvested! You can focus on, you know, doing what you love- such as running your business!

Attract More Customers

We mentioned earlier that most young adults feel very comfortable using technology to pay for their goods and services. If you are aiming to attract a younger set of eyes, the electronic payment option may be non-negotiable.

After all, how much cash do you walk around with? When was the last time you balanced a checkbook? Most millennials don’t even know how to write a check these days!

The way we spend money continues to evolve, but it doesn’t appear that electronic means are going anywhere anytime soon. That means, as a business owner, you need to continually think about how you can make life easier for you and your customers.

You also need to think about how you can make payment options attractive to as much of your target audience as possible.

Final Thoughts on Electronic Payments

As a business owner, it’s critical that you take your customers’ needs and expectations into consideration when making decisions.

Streamlining your electronic payments process makes your work easier for everyone involved. Interested in learning more tips about succeeding and mastering in your work? Be sure to check out our business archives today!