Following the most recent addition to the Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BAML) ePayables offering, I had a chance to have a chat with Samridhi Sarin, Director, Senior Product Manager of ePayables at BAML. The announcement was the launch of a new feature called exact auth override. This feature, which may sound technical and complicated, is actually quite simple and useful; it allows customers to have better control over payments and is a strong deterrent against fraud. Starting mid-July customers will have access to exact auth override and it will enable them to authorize payments of specific amounts, down to the penny.
What does this mean?
Well, if a payment has to be made to a supplier for the amount of $4,362.75, this feature allows the supplier to charge exactly $4,362.75 on the card; any other amount will be declined. This feature will prevent unnecessary reconciliation issues on both the buyer and the supplier side. For example, if the supplier makes a mistake and charges $4,362.57, without such a feature the payment would go through without any issue causing additional reconciliation work as a result when the mistake is uncovered. In another example, a supplier may decide to combine three invoices together into one so that the buyer makes one lump sum payment. However, the buyer may prefer not make one large payment causing the supplier to re-issue the invoices and thereby delaying the process. This feature is designed to be used in specific scenarios and will not work for all suppliers. Exact auth override is designed to stop errors from happening, drive automated reconciliation and to prevent delays in the processing of payments.
This new enhancement together with the ones from 2011 put BAML in a position to offer a full range of payment options to its clients. Last year, BAML launched two significant features:
- Secure email – allows clients to communicate card account numbers securely to their suppliers (the strategic suppliers that keep account numbers on file). For those that choose not to keep account numbers on file, they can send the number each time together with the remittance advice via secure email.
- Push Payments – these are payments initiated by the buyer and enable them to automate supplier payments by disbursing the funds directly to a supplier’s account.
What’s more, the new features are available on both single use cards as well as dedicated vendor cards, giving buyers and suppliers a full range of options to meet their payment/ receivables needs.
Current BAML ePayables customers (of which there are more than 1,000) have access to all of the new payment options with no additional cost or implementation effort. BAML account managers work with customers to identify the most appropriate payment method for certain types of payments or for certain suppliers.
Again, it seems that we were right on the money with our prediction that 2012 has a very good chance to become “The Year of Electronic Payments”. It certainly will be interesting to see how American Express’s new offering PAYVE will compete against the likes of BAML.
