Five Things to Look Out for in the World of Payments

Don’t look now, but we are nearly halfway through 2016. Knowing this, 2017 is a mere seven months away, and for globally-focused businesses, it’s time to get plans in order for what’s on the horizon.

For payments professionals in global businesses, adapting early could lead to reducing time spent managing payments, reducing friction, improving visibility, and gaining an edge over competitors. Simply put, the payments function has begun to face more and more disruption, and capitalizing now could help your organization to thrive.

So what should you look out for in 2017? Faster pace to meet the demands of payees, a ‘network of networks’ spanning a wide variety of platforms, an evolution beyond legacy systems to span the globe and improve reach to all, collaboration between Fintech and traditional players, and expectation of transparency among all those affected, according to new research from San Francisco payout provider Hyperwallet.

Meeting the Increased Expectations of Payees

We’ve all heard the term digital revolution, and analysts’ expectations on how it will impact businesses today and in the future. Noting this, your payees have been taking notice of the evolving world of payments, looking for faster, easier, and frictionless payments no matter where they are.

Meeting these Needs

By doing this, payers and payees are turning to technology—electronic accounts payable, ePayments, virtual card numbers, and more to ease the payment and reception process of funds. To meet the expectations of your payees or suppliers, you will need to lead the way—boosting operational efficiencies and cash flow, reducing fraud, improving data quality, and increasing the productivity of your accounts payable team.

Explore the value of ePayments in You Have the Technology, Rid Your Organization of Paper Checks and Five Strategies to Uncover Value in Procure-to-Pay through E-Payments.

A ‘Network of Networks’ Including Major Players from All Categories

The future of B2B/B2C disbursements will be a network of networks that constantly adapts to technology innovation and evolving requirements— spanning banking, credit cards, mobile money, and digital payment platforms. With 50% of large businesses and 90% of small businesses still using paper checks to make payments, the payments industry is ripe for innovation in order to overcome roadblocks.

Overcoming These Roadblocks with Payments Innovation

In What to Know about Money and Payments in 2020, we looked at a number of tech-driven disruptors that are almost guaranteed to impact the way we’ll work in the years ahead. It can be overwhelming—and even seasoned professionals don’t always know how to begin preparing for change. To address this, we shared with you 3 tips to prepare your payments organization for what’s next, sharing how to address your employees’ comfort levels with technology, educate them, and encourage buy in.

New Tactics to Address Emerging and Unbanked Markets

The financial industry will evolve beyond legacy infrastructure to include the unbanked and underbanked, eventually reaching all 7 billion people on the planet. Those in emerging markets still expect options for how they want to pay and be paid, and accomplishing this in their preferred form of currency is critical.

Meeting the Needs of the Unbanked and Underbanked

In many parts of the world, there is a mobile money revolution going on, with, for instance, 88% of Kenyans having a mobile phone while only 45% have a bank account. To address the unbanked, the rise of direct carrier billing has grown among these unbanked or underbanked nations, expected to increase to $24.7 billion in 2019, up from the $14.5 billion in 2014. Learn more about direct carrier billing in “An Introduction to Direct Carrier Billing,” as well as in our Mobile Payments Infographic.

Collaborate or Falter: Legacy, Meet Innovator

New digital players and traditional banks will have to join forces to succeed. Instead of labeling banks as their adversary, digital players need to recognize banks’ value-add in the global financial system and find ways to make the banking infrastructure more efficient. At the same time, banks need to be open to new types of partnerships and embrace digital disruptors as partners, not competitors.

Banks: Embrace the Brightness of Innovators, Innovators: Embrace the Scale of Banks

In a recent Economist Intelligence guide, “In Tech We Trust,” researchers take a deeper look into the present and future of retail banking, a cashless society, payments, and emerging competition from innovators in the FinTech space. In What to Know about Money and Payments in 2020, we shared how finance has and will continue to change, and how collaboration will be key to survival on both sides of the table.

“The scale of disruption is unprecedented, across every market, every distribution channel and every single product line. Fintech poses a potentially fatal risk and will be a severe test of banks’ IT systems and their ability to respond to rapid changes in customer expectations, short product development times and growing cyber risks.”

Transparency is Critical Throughout the Value Chain

In order for global payments to drive growth, solutions need the ability to track transactions throughout the entire payment process. Transparent pricing structures with real-time quote availability need to be put in place so customers can budget transactions. Payout providers need to offer flexible types of integration (e.g., APIs, Webhooks) to allow customers and third-party platforms to query—or be promptly notified of—the current status of their transactions. Finally, payout providers will need to innovate their customer service models to be able to quickly and cost-effectively resolve any issues.

Transparency for All

More finance and accounting professionals are realizing that to remain competitive—or to build a competitive edge—their business processes need to reflect what’s newer, faster, and more efficient. In 5 Reasons Your Suppliers Love to Receive Virtual Cards, we shared with you (among other benefits) the improved data and security your suppliers will receive, and in Promoting Virtual Card Numbers Among Your Suppliers, we shared with you the steps to help them embrace VCNs.

Related Resources

For even more information on how you can evolve with the times, follow @WEXIncNews on Twitter, and look into these related resources:

Five Things to Look Out for in the World of Payments in 2017