Cheaper payments that pay more

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Sam has been with GoCardless since Jan 2020. Within the business Sam specialises in writing, curating and editing content for large and enterprise businesses. The UK-based marketer boasts over 5 years of content marketing experience in B2B SaaS start-ups working with global enterprise retailers and merchants. She is also a BSc psychology graduate bringing a fresh perspective to the GoCardless team. See full bio

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As a Senior Product Marketing Manager at GoCardless, Coral is focused on Top of Funnel and ensuring that customer-facing teams have the correct positioning, messaging, and understanding of pain points to deliver payment solutions to SMEs. Before GoCardless Coral worked as a Product Marketing Manager at PayPal and has experience in the travel industry as an entrepreneur. She is also a certified attorney. Coral completed an MBA at the London Business School.ConnectSee full bio

Last editedJun 20232 min read

Every business collects payments.

Whether you collect recurring or one-off payments, in an unpredictable economy getting it wrong could unnecessarily cost you money and impact your bottom line.

Are you getting the best return on investment (ROI) for your payments? Could cheaper payments actually pay you more? Imagine minimising the total cost of collecting payments while maximising your return. That would be a win-win.

By understanding both the direct and indirect costs of collecting payments and ultimately the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO), you’ll be fully informed to make decisions about your payment strategy that will positively impact your bottom line.

For a deep dive into all the costs associated with collecting payments and how to streamline and mitigate them, check out our ebook: “The costs of collecting payments”.

Getting to know your payment costs

When you consider the costs of collecting and processing payments, you might think of the direct costs:

Transaction fees
Foreign transactions (FX) fees
Mandate and file submissions
Refunds

By only considering the direct costs, you could be subjecting your business to unnecessary and costly expenses. From the indirect costs of managing payments, like manual processes and staff costs, to the indirect costs of payment inefficiencies, like fraud and failed payments.

Collecting payments goes beyond transaction fees and costs your business more than you think. Let’s dive into which indirect costs impact your bottom line.

Automated payments create automatic cost savings

Forrester’s study showed that most businesses have 20+ full-time employees to manage recurring payments. Meanwhile, the PwC 2021 Finance Effectiveness Benchmarking Study, found that 26% of the time spent on customer billing by finance teams could be automated.

There lies the game-changing opportunity for efficiency; automation.

By automating your recurring payments with a global bank payment solution like GoCardless, you can:

Cut the admin costs: Make finance/account receivable teams up to 21% more efficient
Successful payments: Collect 97.3% of payments successfully on the first try so you don’t have to chase as many failed payments
Better cash flow: Say goodbye to 20+ Days Sales Outstanding (DSO) and get paid in as little as 3.6 days on average
Level up against fraud: Reduce fraud by up to 62% with our end-to-end anti-fraud product
Save money: Spend up to 56% less per transaction

Savings don’t stop at automation

Businesses face challenges when it comes to collecting one-off payments like first-time payments, one-off charges for goods and services, or topping up an account.

Current payment methods are outdated, made for a world before the age of the internet. Cards are expensive and bank transfers are slow.

Imagine collecting one-off payments instantly, without the need to enter lengthy card details. And getting paid in as little as one business day. Thanks to open banking, it’s now a reality with GoCardless Instant Bank Pay.

Cheaper than cards - These instant bank payments are typically 54% cheaper than online card transactions.
Collect more payments - With a frictionless authorisation process and no need to enter lengthy card details, collect as many as 99% of payments successfully on the first try with Instant Bank Pay.
Instant confirmation - Get real-time confirmation for you and your customers on the status of a payment as money moves directly from one bank account to another in as little as one business day.

Cheaper payments that pay more

By combining automation and frictionless, more successful payment experiences, your business can make your payments work harder. Reducing the overall cost of collecting payments and maximising the revenue you can collect as a result will see your business benefit from a better payment ROI and boost your bottom line.

From recurring to one-off payments, Plend only needs one solution

"We don't need a full-time financial operations person at this stage, which for a lending start-up is pretty unheard of. We've already saved upwards of £50,000 in costs with GoCardless, and that will only get larger as we put more volume through the business and the platform." Rob Pasco, Co-Founder and CEO, Plend