Why a Single-Vendor Payment Solution?
May 26, 2021 by Peter Weed
With bill transactions shifting from cash and in-person payments to mailed and electronic payments, local governments are seeking more efficient processes to streamline the collection of multiple payment types from varied locations and across departments.
A single-vendor payment system offers the solution for optimizing your operations and enhancing security by eliminating the need to connect solutions from multiple vendors. As the Government Finance Officers Association notes, “Fewer disparate solutions means more control.”
To maximize the advantages of a single vendor for payments and financials, an ideal provider would handle all aspects of the payment process, including onboarding, payment support, reconciliation, cashiering, and hardware.
In addition, combining payment and financial solutions built by the same vendor provides further benefits. Native connectivity ensures data is uniformly updated throughout an organization, improving payment activity reconciliation, eliminating silos, and providing accurate, timely financial data to help make more informed decisions.
Four Ways a Single-Vendor Solution Can Help Your Operations:
- Simplifying Connectivity: A single-vendor solution eliminates the time-consuming and costly building and maintenance of application programming interfaces (APIs) to connect software. In addition, upgrades are streamlined because single-vendor solutions are built from the ground up for compatibility while updates in multiple vendor situations may require further customization during upgrades.
- Reducing the Burden on IT: Connecting single-vendor software across an organization reduces the burden on IT staff who benefit from consistent tools across solutions. In fact, all users benefit from a unified user experience. Support is also simplified when IT has a single source of contact rather than contacts with multiple vendors who are unfamiliar with the total system.
- Building a More Secure Process: In the world of data security, a key goal is to reduce exposure to sensitive data. A single-vendor solution means multiple vendors will not have access to payment information. A single-vendor approach also simplifies the implementation of strong security standards and can limit credit card processing gateways to only those using point-to-point encrypted device communication.
- Streamlining Reconciliation and Keeping Data Current: A single-vendor, web-based solution can collect on all payments from any office made to an organization, miscellaneous receivables, and bills generated by third-party vendors. In addition, a web-based solution can be accessed from any workstation with browser connectivity. This offers flexibility of deployment and supports the collection of funds from offices across a community. Whether paid at city hall or via a convenient, user-friendly portal, the web-based solution provides scalability and connectivity.
Why include cashiering in an enterprise-wide payment solution?
An ideal payment solution will include a cashiering solution built natively into the system and does not require the added cost of API maintenance and ownership to function. A native cashiering solution standardizes your collection process, and it creates a single-entry point for payments, providing greater control of your workflow, making compliance reporting easier.