Independent Banker - February 2020 - 36

PORTFOLIO
not only B2B payments, but also how
companies operate. "
Avidia Bank in Hudson, Mass., is
one community bank with its finger
on the pulse.
" The majority of B2B payments
are by paper check, which is the
most inefficient and expensive alternative, "
says Erin Curry, assistant
vice president for business development
and payment solutions at the
$1.7 billion-asset community bank.
2023 or 2024. And customers' desire
for faster or more versatile payments
options from commercial deposits to
invoicing is starting to nudge more
banks to work with fintechs or their
core vendors. In September 2019,
JPMorgan Chase & Co. rolled out
same-day deposits for its small business
customers through WePay, a
payments platform company the New
York bank acquired two years earlier.
Core processing vendors are getting
" Digital B2B payments are right around
the corner; people want to see B2B
payments solutions that allow for
instant easier payment solutions. "
-Erin Curry, Avidia Bank
" Subsequently, there is a tremendous
opportunity for community banks to
begin providing B2B payment services
to small- to mid-sized businesses. "
In 2015, Avidia Bank went live with
an online clearinghouse, linked2pay,
which offers instant merchant settlement.
As of this writing, Curry says
the bank is also slated to offer realtime
payments through The Clearing
House by January 2020.
" If there's an opportunity and you
wait and you don't take advantage
of that opportunity, by the time you
decide to get in, many times, it's too
late, " Curry says. " Digital B2B payments
are right around the corner;
people want to see B2B payments
solutions that allow for instant easier
payment solutions. "
Faster payments in the spotlight
Faster payments are getting lots of
airtime after the Federal Reserve
announced that FedNow, its realtime
payments network, will debut in
36 Q ICBA Independent Banker Q February 2020
into the game, too. In October 2019,
Jack Henry & Associates offered
15 of its clients real-time payments
to business customers through its
proprietary payments hub, JHA PayCenter,
which in turn connects to The
Clearing House. JHA PayCenter promises
a single integrated hub from which
banks could eventually offer evolving
business payments offerings and help
clients compete with disruptors in the
payments space.
Payments security considerations
Curry says community banks should
put greater emphasis on a payments
strategy that includes faster payments.
" Rather than including payments as
a strategic initiative, most banks continue
to focus on initiatives that are
generic in nature and do not provide
a strategic advantage, " she says, adding
that many board members and
senior executives " need to get out of
their comfort zone and begin providing
[real-time] payment services that
are in high demand. "
That said, Ramamurthi advises
community banks to consider the
whole picture in terms of risk.
" As community banks begin to
embrace the need for faster B2B payments,
there are also concerns about
risk management and compliance
preventing financial institutions from
enacting a real-time payments model, "
Independent Banker - February 2020

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