Pacing Payments

Alain Raes, SWIFT, explained the key drivers and trends that could lead to the future of 21st century B2B payments in Europe

Ever since the creation of the internet, we have come to expect ‘always on, always available’ communications across every aspect of our lives. As the payments industry evolved from paper-based to digital, these growing expectations have proven to be challenging. In B2B cross-border transactions, for example, supply chains frequently move faster than the underlying payments, leading to inefficiencies and loss of value.

Today, a generational shift is underway in payments industry infrastructure and technology that promises to deliver 21st century speed, transparency, and efficiency to B2B payments. Within this article, we highlight key drivers and trends.

Mastercard has announced a service to help people in the gig economy who have to tie together income from a variety of jobs, contracts and part-time gigs like dog walking.

In an alliance with Evolve Bank & Trust, Mastercard said  it is using Mastercard Send, the company’s push payment solution, to enable pay advances, which is expected to have greater appeal to people working without traditional paychecks.

The rise of digitisation has been accompanied by the unprecedented growth of real-time payments. In an exclusive interview with CNBC-TV18’s Shashwat DC, President and CEO of ACI Worldwide Philip Heasley weighs in on why this is a good thing, and what it means in the Indian context, and much more.

 Excerpts from the interview:

What gives real-time payments an edge over conventional methods like credit and debit cards, especially in our digital-first world?

Cards are very efficient; they’re very global. They’ve got acceptance all around the world, but they’re a fairly expensive way of doing business. You know, ACI is a 44-year-old company. We have been committed to real-time payments our entire existence. Depending on the market, we tend to find which of our products the market embraces. We’ve been in it a long time, and our positioning is that we are not committed to any digital scheme, any real-time scheme. We’re there to facilitate every scheme because we believe that money will be fungible over time. So, if you go and put the right pipes together, you are able to execute a payment, regardless of what type it is.

When business owners apply for merchant accounts at their financial institution, the process entails stacks of confusing paperwork and waiting for acceptance.

Instead, business owners need a simple tool that enables them to put their finances on cruise control and focus on their passion— a tool that simplifies the payment process altogether.

Businesses trust their financial institutions to deliver faster payment options and reliable customer service, rather than third-party providers.