7 reasons why you should be collecting Direct Debit with GoCardless

GoCardless makes it easy for you to get paid on time with Direct Debit. 

With no contract and no upfront commitment required, you can be up and running very quickly.

Payments are quick and easy to set up, more affordable and more reliable than accepting card payments. 

GoCardless can also eliminate late payments and automate tedious financial admin, saving you cash flow issues and valuable time.

Direct Debit is actually easier and more secure for your customers too, so they’ll prefer it.

1) Direct Debit payments collected on time

It's quick and easy to collect payments on time, every time, with Direct Debit via GoCardless.

You can set up an account with GoCardless for free, with no contract or up-front commitment required. Through the easy-to-use merchant dashboard, it's fast and straightforward to set up payments, so you can be up and running in a matter of minutes.

Inside the dashboard, you can schedule payment collection on a specific date of your choosing. Those payments are then regularly pulled from your customer's bank account on due dates without you lifting a finger.

2) Say goodbye to late payments

With payment collection automated, there's no more chasing late payments.

Surveys show that late payments are a huge problem for UK small businesses, as at any one time, they are owed an average of £8500 in late invoice payments.

GoCardless provides a solution for this issue by eliminating late payments almost entirely.

By enabling businesses to collect payments automatically on pre-scheduled dates, 78% of GoCardless merchants have reduced average debtor days and get paid 47% faster than the average SME.

Schedule the payment and notify your customer in just a few clicks. Once your customer has approved the mandate, no further action is required. The funds will be pulled automatically from the customer's account on the scheduled date, meaning you get paid on time every time.

3) Save time chasing late payments

No more time wasted chasing late payments

While the issue of late payments causes cashflow concerns for small businesses, that is not the only late payment problem that businesses-owners face.

Late payments also inflict a significant time cost on SMEs. Research studies highlight that the average UK SME spends 30 hours a month chasing these late payments.

However, thanks to automated on-time payment collection, GoCardless merchants only need to spend 2.6 hours each month dealing with late or failed payments - that works out as 90% less time than the average business spends chasing late payments.

4) Cheaper than card payments

GoCardless merchants enjoy low transaction fees

Credit card transaction fees can be over 3x more expensive than GoCardless.

On average, credit card fees range between 1.5% - 3%, but exactly how much you'll pay will depend on your card network and your specific fee structure.

Not only is GoCardless cheaper, but we also provide pricing transparency.

Accepting a £500 payment by credit card or debit card will cost a merchant between £7.50 and £15.

However, with GoCardless that same transaction costs just £4.

5) Higher success rate than cards

High success, low failure rate

One of the significant issues for businesses that accept recurring card payments is the relatively high payment failure rate. Card payments fail at a rate of around 10 - 15%, and the main reasons for these failures are lost, cancelled, and expired cards.

In contrast, Direct Debit is an account-to-account payment. As a result, because bank accounts cannot be lost or expire, Direct Debit via GoCardless enjoys a payment success rate of 97.3% on the first try and up to 99.5% with the 'intelligent retry' technology of Success+.

6) Spend less time on financial admin

Save time on manual payments admin

Payments admin such as raising and sending invoices, bank reconciliation, and credit control are time-consuming and expensive for businesses.

A recent YouGov survey found that small businesses spend over 12 hours a month on regular payments admin such as invoicing, accounting, expenses, budgeting, and forecasting.

However, businesses using GoCardless can automate payment collection, reconciliation, and other tasks, spending 59% less time than the average business managing payment admin.

7) Free to get started, easy to set up payments

Super-simple to start using GoCardless

With no upfront commitment and no requirements for contracts to start using GoCardless, there is no risk in trying it out. The merchant dashboard is easy-to-use and makes it super simple to set up payments with a few clicks.

You can take advantage of our pay-as-you-go pricing to create your account and start onboarding customers today. Click here to get started.