The Benefits of Electronic Payments for B2B Transactions

In the digital age, businesses are increasingly moving away from traditional payment methods such as checks and cash, and adopting electronic payment methods for B2B transactions. Electronic payments offer numerous advantages over traditional payment methods, making them an ideal choice for businesses looking to streamline their payment processes and improve cash flow. What are the benefits of electronic payments for B2B transactions?

Faster payment processing

Electronic payments are processed much faster than traditional payment methods. With electronic payments, the payment is transferred directly from the payer's bank account to the payee's account, eliminating the need for physical checks or cash. This significantly reduces payment processing time, allowing businesses to receive payments faster and improve cash flow.

Increased convenience

Electronic payments offer increased convenience for both the payer and the payee. With electronic payments, businesses can make and receive payments from anywhere at any time, without the need to visit a bank or write a physical check. This can save time and money on administrative tasks, allowing businesses to focus on other important tasks.

Improved accuracy

Manual payment processing methods such as checks can be prone to errors and mistakes, leading to delays and potentially costly mistakes. Electronic payments eliminate these errors by automating the payment process, ensuring accuracy and reducing the risk of mistakes.

Enhanced security

Electronic payments offer enhanced security compared to traditional payment methods. With electronic payments, sensitive financial information is encrypted and stored securely, reducing the risk of fraud and data breaches. This can provide peace of mind for businesses and their customers, knowing that their financial information is protected.

Reduced costs

Electronic payments can help businesses reduce costs associated with payment processing. With electronic payments, businesses can save on costs associated with paper checks, postage, and administrative tasks. This can help businesses improve their bottom line and increase profitability.

In conclusion, electronic payments offer numerous benefits for B2B transactions. From faster payment processing to improved security and reduced costs, electronic payments can help businesses streamline their payment processes and improve cash flow. As more businesses adopt electronic payments, it is clear that the future of B2B transactions lies in electronic payment methods.

Options for Accepting International Payments

There are few choices when trying to set up international payments for your ecommerce website. PayPal and Stripe are great options for those that don't have a merchant account but still want to accept transactions from international customers.

PayPal
If you need to accept payments from most countries PayPal is the clear winner, but there are still some countries that are not supported.. At the time of this writing there are 203 markets and 26 currencies available. See the full list here at the PayPay Global web page.

Countries not supported by PayPal included:

•     Afghanistan
•     Bangladesh
•     Central African Republic
•     North Korea
•     Equatorial Guinea
•     Ghana
•     Haiti
•     Iran
•     Iraq
•     Lebanon
•     Liberia
•     Libya
•     Myanmar
•     Pakistan
•     South Sudan
•     Sudan
•     Syria
•     Timor-Leste / East Timor
•     Uzbekistan

Stripe
The newcomer Stripe is in the process of adding more countries all the time. Currently your business must be based in one of the following countries in order to use their international payment processing services.

• Australia
• Canada
• Denmark
• Finland
• Ireland
• Norway
• Sweden
• United Kingdom
• United States

Stripe does have private betas running that support payment processing from other countries.

There are many other considerations involved with supporting international payments on your eCommerce website like currency conversion rates, foreign transaction fees as well as a host of other items you'll need to review. One of the first steps will be to find the countries and currencies you'll want to support and make sure your selected payment processor supports them. 

Payment Gateway Restful API's

RESTful APIs have been around for a while but it's only recently that we have seen a influx of these types of APIs with regards to payment gateways. Stripe, Amazon and Samurai all offer RESTful APIs.


Restful APIs provide some great benefits.

• Gateway's can take advantage of HTTP cache and proxy servers to handle high load.
• Complex applications can be narrowed down to simple resources
• Easy to consume no matter your scripting language. 

Not all gateways offer a RESTful API. Notably Braintree and PayPal. Braintree for instance offers comprehensive libraries that make it easy to use your programming language of choice. PayPal on the other hand uses NVP (name value pairs) or a SOAP based API in lieu of rest.

The type of API offered by your payment gateway may affect your decision on whether or not you want to use their services so always check the API before you sign up.

Photo Check Deposits

Almost two years ago, Chase updated its iPhone app to include photo check deposits:

Deposit checks with two camera clicks.

Instead of driving to the bank, you can deposit your check with your Chase Mobile App. Just snap a picture of the front and back of your endorsed check and send it using your Chase Mobile App. more...

Amazon bids to become a bigger e-commerce technology provider to retailers

Already by far the biggest online retailer, Amazon.com Inc. is bidding to become a bigger supplier of e-commerce technology to other retailers and consumer goods manufacturers. With its release this week of its new version of Amazon WebStore, experts say, Amazon has come up with a compelling offering that lets other e-retailers take advantage of Amazon’s services and strong reputation.

“Sellers that adopt this platform are not just leveraging the technology, they’re also leveraging Amazon’s reputation and the guarantees Amazon provides to consumers related to the online shopping experience,” says Eric Best, CEO of Mercent Corp., an online marketing services firm.more...

Credit Card Tokenization

The hot topic of the year seems to be credit card tokenization. Merchants are confused on the subject and what it means to them. It all stems from the payment card rules and regulations on storage of credit card data. Tokenization is a fairly simple process that doesn't have to be expensive.

Why do we need credit card tokenization?
Storing credit card numbers for the average sized merchant was OK not to long ago, but those days are long gone. The payment card industry now governs the storage of credit card numbers and customer information. This is actually a good thing, but can be a pain if your a small to medium sized merchant.


What is credit card tokenization?
Credit card tokenization turns a credit card number into a token that is only recognized by the service provider, or merchant account provider. For example lets say your credit card number is "4125-1512-1512-1562" that turns into a token "4324223". If a hacker has stolen your token it is useless to them. This means your eCommerce store can store tokens easily, even without encryption.

What are the benefits of credit card tokenization?
The biggest benefit you'll see right away is savings. When you only store tokens there is only a simple SAQ (self assessment questionnaire) that needs to be filled out to become PCI compliant. Re-billing or recurring billing is now a simple process, simply send the token to the payment gateway and you have re-billed without asking for payment information again. Need to reverse a change, send the token.

How much is credit card tokenization?
Usually free. I've never seen a provider charge for the service. What is different is the way they offer the service. You need to be sure the tokenization service will work with your software or web site.

eCommerce service providers network

Recently we added our little blog to a directory to increase traffic and came across one worth mentioning here. The directory is comprised of eCommerce and brick and mortar business vendors. They have a nice break down of specific categories that pertain to the payments industry.

With categories like, PCI DSS Compliance, Point of Sale, Check Readers and more, merchants should be able to find any kind of service to support their business. If your a provider and need more traffic like we all do, try adding your site.