Five Ways Banks Simplify Business Payments for Corporate Customers

Like consumers, businesses require fast, secure payment methods tailored to their in-the-moment needs. 

This means financial institutions must be able to customize the range of payment processes they offer as client businesses grow, according to “The New User Experience,” a PYMNTS and FIS collaboration based on a survey of 311 financial institution executives. 

Get the report: The New User Experience 

Without these functionalities, businesses that depend on rapid payments could see delays that grind their supply chains to a halt. To fill in the gaps, financial institutions are adding the same digital features consumers have become accustomed to — such as instant payments and refunds and embedded finance — to their toolkits. 

Solving B2B Clients’ Pain Points 

PYMNTS’ research found that payments consumerization translates into a wish list of five key digital payments features that match financial institutions’ identification of their B2B clients’ pain points: 

• Supplier portals. PYMNTS’ research found that 42% of financial institutions say the inability to offer supplier portals is a problem area for corporate clients when making payments to their suppliers. 
• Instant data visibility. Twenty-three percent of financial institutions said the inability to share data across all functions is a source of payments friction for their corporate clients. 
• Enterprise resource planning (ERP) integration. Twenty-four percent of financial institutions said payment integration with ERP is a problem area for their corporate clients. 
• Real-time cash flow management. This was cited as a hurdle by 26% of financial institutions. 
• Simple accounts payable (AP) and accounts receivable (AR) integration. Fourteen percent of financial institutions said one of their corporate clients’ problem areas is having an integrated system between AP and AR. 

Engaging, Retaining Corporate Clients 

PYMNTS’ research revealed that although two-thirds of financial institutions recognize the need for new digital B2B payment solutions, only three out of 10 say their current tools sufficiently reduce friction for their clients. 

Neeraj Gupta, vice president, B2B Solutions at FIS, told PYMNTS in a June interview that now more than ever, application programming interfaces (APIs) are accessible to financial services firms of all sizes. They can be held, deployed and used internally at providers such as FIS, and can be bundled so that even the smallest banks can craft new services and products in a streamlined fashion. 

See also: APIs Pave Way for New Consumer, Business Digital Experiences 

Gupta said that by harnessing APIs, providers, including FIS, can “ripple and modularize” new functions for bank clients in building-block fashion, which gives rise to a menu of choices as banks modernize their digital features.  

Alongside quick deployments, that broad range of choices is proving instrumental in transforming both consumer-facing banking and B2B commerce. 

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