Author: Drew Edwards

Digital Payouts Demand Payments Ubiquity

August 24, 2021By Drew Edwards

Enabling companies to send disbursements – or payouts – to consumers and small businesses digitally, safely, and reliably is infinitely harder than equipping companies to take payments from consumers. It may seem as simple as connecting to one or two APIs because you’re told what great “coverage” they have, but still, the reach is not ubiquitous. Historically, consumer payouts have been offered via ACH or check, in part because checks are still universally accepted here…

Ingo Money’s Newest Enhancements Redefine the Standard for Modern Money Movement, Again.

July 22, 2021By Drew Edwards

The world has changed. And with it, so have our expectations of money. Money must be easy, portable, and work for us rather than against us. When someone pays us, we want the money to be instantly available in whatever account or on whichever card works best for us right now. In short, we need our money to be modern. Today, I am proud to share that Ingo Money is launching an expanded suite of…

Why 2021 Is All About Disbursements 3.0

April 5, 2021By Drew Edwards

Ushering In The Era Of Disbursements 3.0 Depending on who you ask, old-style disbursements began their digital transformation in 2017 when Uber disrupted the traditional idea of payday, introducing on-demand payments and early wage access. When ACH was still considered fast, that was transformational. The progression from paper dominance and ACH to point solutions to the stage we’re entering now – let’s call it “Disbursements 3.0” — is creating startling new possibilities for instant payments at scale,…

Writing the Instant Payments Playbook

January 16, 2020By Drew Edwards

The Dawn Of Instant Payments The majority of small businesses fail because they can’t match accounts payable with accounts receivable. It’s the same for people. From SMBs to individuals and families, financial health comes down to cash flow. That fact – along with timing and technology – has brought us to the brink of a historic moment when “instant” money changes payments forever. Instant is already bringing change to millions in the consumer and SMB…

Sinking The Myth Of ‘Float’

January 6, 2020By Drew Edwards

“Float” – the notorious interval between when payors send funds and when payees possess those funds – has long been held as sacred and immutable by financial institutions (FIs) both as a risk mitigation practice and to bolster liquidity. There’s just one problem with float being at or near the center of your 2020 payments policy: it’s a fallacy. Float as a policy is irrelevant and outdated. Not only is float of no discernible benefit…

The Future Of Instant Payments Hangs on Convenience and Choice

November 26, 2019By Drew Edwards

Life is full of necessary evils. But while parallel parking and waiting on hold for customer service were once thought to be unavoidable hassles of everyday living, technologies like hands-free parking and chatbots have helped to eliminate them. Paper checks are no different. No one will ever consider them to be the best, fastest or cheapest form of payment – only the most widely used. Consumers rarely enjoy writing them, and businesses don’t like paying…

Delivery: Who Moves The Money — And Where Does It Need To Go?

October 28, 2019By Drew Edwards

The payments industry loves to talk about rails — whose rails are the fastest, cheapest, most secure, most accepted, most compliant. Consumers? Not so much. Except when it boils down to a single question: “How/when do I get my money?” Nobody cares what rails are used any more than I care which wires or satellites transmit my phone call to you. What customers do care about is the experience — how fast the funds arrive,…

The ROI Of Instant: Making The Business Case

October 8, 2019By Drew Edwards

A business can look at measuring the value of instant payments in terms of how much it will save by stepping away from the costly and inefficient world of paper checks, or it can evaluate it in terms of the auxiliary services and features it can offer to its customers – and potentially monetize in the future. However, there could be a simpler way to frame the inherent value of instant payments. The real question…

Ubiquity; Impossible without Payment Choice

October 1, 2019By Drew Edwards

Is it possible to have too much choice? Not really, when it comes to “how to instant.” Instant payments present a world of possibilities for creating better consumer experiences. The concept is both incredibly simple and incredibly intuitive: offer customers 24/7 access to good funds on demand, however and wherever they want them. Said another way, let consumers get paid the same way they pay you. Let them choose from what’s in their wallet, payment…

Keeping Check Fraud In Check

August 26, 2019By Drew Edwards

In the age of data breaches, malware and account takeovers, “check fraud” might seem impossibly antiquated. As financial institutions know, it’s no small matter and hardly a thing of the past. Check fraud was responsible for more than $18 billion in losses last year in the U.S. and has hit about 70 percent of all organizations in the country. Why Is Check Fraud Still Persistent? The digital advances that make cashing or depositing checks easier…