In a recent Inc. Magazine article on Electronic Banking, I made the point that online transactions are becoming easier and more prevalent.  According to a SunTrust Bank survey, in 2009 a payments “tipping point” was reached when more payments were made electronically with credit and debit cards and ACH than traditional cash and checks.  There was over $3 Trillion in e-commerce trade recorded from nearly 200 million internet users, and over 14 billion ACH payments.  If you company is still anchored to check payment systems, it might be worth considering some ways that E Payments can help control expenses.  

1. Control: Paying electronically gives you control over your purchases and helps you manage the problems associated with manually managing paper cash, checks, expense reports and receipts.  Business owners are using cards for ever larger commercial purchases, from raw materials and parts to travel and entertainment. Vendor discounts may outweigh the credit advantage of delaying payments on terms.  Using individual cards within a Master Account with preset limts allows you to control employee business expenditure.

2.  Analysis: Making purchases electronically gives you information and reports that can help you track, analyze and optimize your spending.  Daily downloads, categorized spending and year end annotated analyses all help to control and review spending.  Reconciliation is simplified with downloaded transactions.

3. Visibility: Paying electronically gives you more visibility on your purchases by allowing you to consolidate your purchase transactions into a single online bank account.

4. Simplicity: Making your purchase electronically allows you to streamline cash flow management and reporting by eliminating much of the time and hassle associated with manually managing paper, cash, checks, expenses reports and receipts.

5. Savings: Check and credit cards can save you money by helping you earn discounts and rewards for making everyday business purchases.

Contact David Kirkup, B2B CFO®  Partner on 404 348 0326 or dkirkup@b2bcfo.com for more information and free company analysis.