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What is the best way to take regular payments?

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As Global Head of Content Marketing, Chris oversees all of the content requirements for our organic, growth marketing, and demand generation campaigns. This requires a fundamental understanding of the pain points our customers are experiencing and a thorough comprehension of the ways those customers consume and engage with content. A growth marketing expert in the tech space, Chris has worked with complex global businesses such as Google, AWS, Microsoft, SAP, Adobe, Dell and Oracle to grow their most valuable customers, increase revenue and speed up deal cycles. He has also led on customer lifecycle management programs and account-based marketing strategies for BlackRock, EY, Grant Thornton and UBS. ConnectSee full bio

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David and his team manage relationships with banks, scheme providers, and other parties involved in payment transactions in the UK and Scandinavia. David has worked in the finance and payment industry for over 12 years, primarily focusing on the BACs and Faster Payments schemes. He has sat on governance committees and chaired cross-government public sector working groups. David is also a regular attendee at the SIBOS and MoneyLIVE financial conferences. ConnectSee full bio

Last editedOct 2023

A table summarising the differences between credit card (CPA), cash, cheque or Bacs transfer and Direct Debit.

There are a number of different ways to take regular payments. You could use standing orders, regular payments by credit card (known as a ‘continuous payment authority’), cash, cheque or Bacs payment. Or you could use Direct Debit.

While we obviously think Direct Debit is the simplest and most efficient option, which is best for you will depend on your business. To help you decide which is the right option for you, we’ve summarised each in this short table.

	Cash/cheque/Bacs	CPA	Standing Order	Direct Debit
What is it?	One-off payments by cheque or bank transfer.	A pre-authorisation from customers to take any future payments from their credit card.	A fixed, regular bank transfer set up and managed by the customer.	A pre-authorisation from customers to take any future payments direct from their bank account.
Transaction fees	~£1.50 + 1 hour to pay in	3% + 20p	Free	Varies (see our pricing)
Failure rates	Variable	~5%	Variable	< 1%
Flexibility	Low	High	Low	High
Late payment risk	High	Mid	Mid	None
Admin required	High	Mid	High	Low
Best for	Elderly customers and one-off, high value payments	Consumer subscriptions, low value payments	Strictly fixed payments to small businesses	All consumer subscriptions, regular bills & regular B2B invoicing.