Noventis Trend Watch: V-Cards Provide SMBs with an Easy Path to E-Payments

HOUSTON, Dec.19, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Fintech innovator, Noventis, Inc., (Noventis) has seen small to midsize business (SMB) adoption rates of virtual card (also known as v-card) payments increase significantly over the past 12 months. Virtual card adoption rates have been particularly strong across high-ticket industries, such as professional services; and within industries that have longer, more arduous payment cycles, like healthcare.

Heading into 2018, Noventis expects v-card adoption rates will continue to accelerate as more SMBs look to capitalize on the benefits of e-payments and as more B2B processors recognize the value of extending their electronic payment reach to small businesses. Research from First Annapolis predicts that virtual card payments will double from $83 billion in 2015 to $160 billion in 2018, and explode to over half a trillion dollars by 2024.

Top Reasons Businesses Make the Switch from Paper to Electronic Payments
As businesses continuously seek new ways to gain a competitive edge, many companies see the advantage of streamlining non-revenue generating processes like account receivable and other financial reconciliation processes to improve efficiency or reduce costs.

Seventy-nine percent of organizations that participated in the most recent AFP Payments Cost Benchmarking Survey are seeking to convert paper checks to electronic payments. The median cost of receiving a paper check for organizations with annual revenues below $1 billion is between $2.01-to-$4.00 according to AFP. In the same survey, 88% of AFP respondents cited increased efficiency as the primary reason for transitioning from paper checks to electronic payments, 82% to reduce costs, 60% to prevent fraud and 38% to facilitate straight through processing (STP).

While many large businesses have long reaped the cost savings, efficiency and security benefits of faster payments, SMBs have faced significant e-payment adoption challenges that have forced many to accept the slow nature of paper checks and the associated negative impacts.

Advantages of Using Virtual Cards vs. Paper Checks 
One-time use virtual cards provide the ideal cure to many accounts receivable pains experienced by small businesses without the costs associated with custom software solutions designed for larger businesses or the burdens of joining multiple disparate e-payment networks in order to reach the wide variety of suppliers they pay. The benefits of moving away from checks in favor of v-cards include:

• Lower Fraud Risk: According to an AFP 2017 Payments Fraud and Control Survey, checks are the most common payment rail for fraud. Research indicates that up to 75% of all businesses experience check fraud. In contrast, virtual cards make it almost impossible for fraudsters to steal and re-use the card number since v-cards can be issued in the exact amount of the bill and payment can be restricted to a specific industry.
• Faster Access to Funds: It is no longer practical for businesses to wait up to 7 days for check funds to be available for use. Virtual card payments often clear within 24 hours, which equates to better cash flow and improved revenue cycle performance for SMBs.
• Save Time and Money:  Based on estimates from AFP, receiving a paper check is 5X more expensive than receiving an electronic payment. Although businesses incur credit card fees when v-cards are used as payment, they also gain rich remittance details in return. Many businesses accept this trade-off because the remittance information improves accounting efficiency by supporting automatic reconciliation of payments and transparency into payment activity.

SMB V-Card Adoption Rates
During 2017, SMBs joined the Noventis network at a rate of 4,000 per month, demonstrating that SMBs will embrace electronic payments when longstanding barriers are removed. Of SMBs joining the Noventis network, 40% are in healthcare, 21% professional services (e.g., legal, accounting, insurance), 18% general services (e.g., automotive, property management, landscaping), 16% retail, and 5% municipalities. These SMBs were previously receiving paper check payments from their customers through online banking services.

Looking Ahead to 2018
Noventis is estimating that its payment network will eliminate $1.2 billion in checks from the ecosystem in 2018. The success of fintech initiatives like these has the potential to extend the far reaching environmental, economic and security benefits of reducing our nation's dependence on paper checks beyond big business down to small businesses and, ultimately, to the constituents they serve. Less waste, improved efficiency, lower costs and reduced fraud will ultimately drive SMB's adoption of v-cards as all companies benefit from these realities.

About Noventis
Noventis is trusted by over 5,000 financial institutions, processors and aggregators to deliver electronic payments between the broadest base of businesses and consumers. Since 1998, Noventis has been providing its partners with innovative solutions to longstanding bill payment challenges. Noventis' proprietary processing platform dynamically routes payments to a vast and ever growing network of billers. The patented platform replaces cumbersome transactions, such as paper checks, with a wide array of electronic payment methods, greatly accelerating delivery speed and dramatically lowering costs for payments to billers and suppliers. For more information, visit www.NoventisPayments.com, http://www.linkedin.com/company/noventis-inc. and @Noventis_Inc.

SOURCE Noventis, Inc.

Related Links

http://www.noventispayments.com