Barclaycard Integrates With SAP Upscale Commerce

Barclaycard Payments has expanded its relationship with SAP through an integration of the Barclaycard Smartpay gateway into SAP’s Upscale Commerce Platform.

The company announced the expansion on Tuesday (Oct. 19), saying that it would also enhance the procure-to-pay services offered by SAP Ariba.

“From today, any business signed up to SAP Upscale Commerce will be able to access Barclaycard Smartpay and take advantage of benefits including a frictionless customer experience and bolstered fraud defenses,” Barclaycard said in the news release.

SAP Upscale Commerce is a software-as-a-service (SaaS) commerce solution used by medium-sized direct-to-consumer (D2C) companies, and is designed to give mobile users a seamless experience across a range of devices.

Barclaycards says the integration with smartpay will let these businesses carry out more online conversions by removing friction from payments.

“Over the last 18 months, the pandemic and a changing consumer landscape have impacted the way businesses want to make and take payments,” said Nicole Olbe, managing director of Barclaycard payments partnerships. “Our ever-evolving partnership with SAP is a result of listening to our customers and clients and making sure we are providing them with the tools and capabilities to thrive under challenging circumstances.”

Barclaycard Payments is also offering virtual card services to businesses employing SAP Ariba or SAP ERP software, “giving them a simple end-to-end procure to pay experience.” This will let users minimize late payments to suppliers and enjoy early payment discounts. It will also enable SAP Ariba customers to control ad-hoc purchasing and unlock working capital due to extended payment terms.

Read more: Barclaycard, SAP Team for Better B2B Functions With Smartpay

This announcement marks the latest in a series of Barclaycard/SAP team-ups. In 2019, the companies collaborated to boost B2B payments by marrying Barclaycard’s Precisionpay solution with SAP Ariba, allowing customers to pay vendors through virtual cards much like normal bank transactions.

Last year, the two companies announced an extension of that partnership that would make Smartpay available to a broader range of customers throughout Europe.