Shopping for payment technology for your business can be overwhelming. You need to be able to make the best choices for your company but what do you need to know first? If you’re looking for a payment processor, here are some of the most important current trends, compliance concerns and tools that can help you with your choice.

Just as with many other industries, satisfaction and convenience are top concerns in ACH and credit card payment processing. Customers want to make payments quickly and easily, no matter what business they’re interacting with.

Your company should offer multiple channels and payment types to consumers. Online payment options should be friction-free and simple to navigate.

Consumers have been using digital communication options for some time for personal connections. Payment processors are now offering options to send payment reminders, billing statements and more to consumers through text messaging and email so your company can connect with customers in this way too.

Adhering to compliance is time consuming. A good payment technology will reduce the time and cost your company expends remaining compliant. The main payment compliance concerns you should be aware of are:

Payment processors should help you reduce costs in other areas of your business beyond compliance. They should offer tools that make life easier for your staff by simplifying payment workflows and decreasing the cost of things like paper letters being sent to consumers.

Mailing paper bills to consumers is a significant cost. Along with this, consumers now more frequently prefer electronic communications with companies. This popularity is going to grow even more in the future. Offering these channels in replacement of paper bills or payment reminders will allow your business to cut traditional mail costs even further as time goes on.

Your text and email system may also save training costs – if it’s easy to train new employees to use. The less time you spend training on payment workflows, the more time you have to teach your employees more complex tasks.

Maintaining chargeback ratios can keep your merchant account healthy, saving you money. Using a text or email solution creates a more easily traceable digital transaction trail. Collecting these digital proofs of payment authorization gives your company a safety net to fight chargebacks, keeping your ratio under control and your merchant account safe.

PCI compliance is the biggest compliance concern, but those who accept ACH payments also need to comply with Nacha’s rules, and there are also federal regulations surrounding the way electronic fund transfers are performed.

Of course, an industry regulation that also comes into play is Regulation F. This regulation has many guidelines around how email and text messaging can be used in debt collection when interacting with consumers, and much of that has to do with payment collection through those channels

Nacha recently enhanced bank account verification requirements to protect consumers from fraud and reduce the occurrence of failed ACH payments. For some companies, this rule may cause minor disruption when deciding the right features they should adopt to meet this requirement.

However, once companies have implemented their process, the impacts should be positive. There will be fewer returns from invalid accounts, which will lower return rates and save staff time trying to track down consumers for alternate payment information.

Texting will be used more and more widely for payments as technology advances. It can be used now, of course, to send a payment request directly to a consumer’s phone. Companies are now beginning to use texting to remind consumers of upcoming payments as well. Most people open texts at a much higher rate than email, making the channel a desirable way to interact with consumers about their bills.

Consent is critical. If a consumer has opted out from receiving texts from your company it will be important to get consent before texting them again. Be sure your technology is flagging opt outs by mobile number so you don’t inadvertently contact a consumer by mobile phone if they’ve opted out of receiving texts to that phone number.

But remember, many customers may want to opt back in if they speak to an employee and then decide that (a) the requests from your agency are legitimately important and (b) receiving updates by text is the most convenient method for them personally. Be sure you understand how that consumer can opt back into receiving text messages about any campaigns from your company.

If you want to learn more about how digital communication channels can enhance payment security, improve office workflows and save your company time and money, download this Traditional Vs. Digital Communication for Accounts Receivable comparison.