NEW REPORT: Have Payments-As-A-Service, Will Travel

As more customers engage in cross-border trade, the pressure is on merchants to meet the demand for convenient payment options.

In an effort to meet the changing demands of a growing consumer base, several FinTech players are offering new payment services to address the payment needs of all types of merchants. These services are not just enabling merchants to offer consumers greater convenience, but are also providing new opportunities to foster customer engagement, beef up payment security and collect data insights.

The June Payments-as-a-Service (PaaS) Tracker follows recent developments in the payments industry, from cross-border commerce developments to point-of-sale solutions to loyalty programs and how these new tools could change business operations for retailers large and small — and, yes, medium too.

News from the Payments-as-a-Service Landscape

With the companies stepping up their investments in new payment tools, old ways of interacting at some notable brick-and-mortar businesses are headed for big changes.

For starters, the introduction of new payment solutions could mean a clean start for laundry service merchants and the end of the annoying search for quarters. Integrated cashless and mobile payment solutions provider USA Technologies partnered with cashless hardware manufacturer Setomatic Systems to bring cashless payment options to U.S. laundromats, manage loyalty cards and help consumers locate a free washer or dryer unit close to them using a mobile app.

Laundromats are not the types of only brick-and-mortar businesses that are seeing big changes as a result of new PaaS tools. Other payment solutions could improve the customer experience when car owners get their vehicles serviced at a dealership. A new mobile point-of-sale (mPOS) system introduced at an authorized BMW dealership in Singapore, for instance, will allow customers visiting a dealership for service to make a payment with a customer service agent using the mPOS system instead of visiting the dealership’s payment counter.

Restaurant customers in the U.S. could also find a more convenient way to pay for their meals right at their tables. Posera and Ingenico launched a new pay-at-the-table solution that enables patrons to pay for meals from table-based terminals and gives restaurants owners data to improve operations. These solutions are among several new payment solutions released by FinTech companies in recent weeks that are aimed at enhancing customer experiences, delivering data insights and improving merchant operations.

Speaking of improving operations, the growth of international trade has some platform merchants thinking about improving their global trade profiles to meet increased consumer demand. With global cross-border B2C sales estimated to be valued at roughly $424 billion by 2021, some merchants are realizing the potential at stake and are stepping up their efforts to improve their global payments capabilities.

And, in a recent effort to help merchants meet customer expectations, Paysafe released a report outlining five specific steps merchants can take to improve their cross-border trade strategies and boost their global growth. The recommended strategies include investing in alternative payment methods to establish a strong local presence, improving security and compliance protocols and developing a seamless international eCommerce experience.

A Compass for Merchants Navigating the PaaS Space

With so many new payment tools in the marketplace that offer a wide range of services aimed at helping businesses accept payments and offer cost-saving efficiencies, the search for the right payments provider can be frustrating for some merchants. Because merchant needs vary from company to company and region to region, finding the right solutions provider can be daunting task.

However, a newcomer to the FinTech space may have developed a solution to make the PaaS shopping experience slightly easier. For the June feature story, PYMNTS spoke with Rodney Bain, co-founder and managing director of APEXX FinTech Ltd. about the company’s new platform to make the search for a PaaS provider less “overwhelming.”

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To download the June edition of the PYMNTS.com Payments-as-a-Service Tracker, click the button below…

About the Tracker

The PYMNTS.com Payments-as-a-Service Tracker is designed to give an overview of the trends and activities of merchant platforms that not only enable payment processing of new and old technologies but also integrate with other features to improve the merchant’s experience, including customer engagement, security, omnichannel retail, analytics, inventory management, software and hardware management and more.