SIIA, Part II
7) in order to eliminate cutting paper checks to pay ebills, the number of billers in the fold goes up geometrically; e.g. - it took 1,100 billers to get to the current 50% electronic payment, it will take about 5,000 to get to 60% electronic and he didn't want to think about how many will be needed to get to 70%, probably the maximum achievable.
8) if they cut a paper check, but are able to aggregate over 100 payments together (on a list provided to the biller) in that one check, it is even cheaper than an electronic one.
9) it costs about $150,000 to implement a single biller and can take up to six months if that biller wants the richest functionality in that bill.
10) billers have decided they want the thin consolidator model so that they can control the special offerings or services and work on disputed items from their site. Transpoint, with its thick consolidator model doesn't allow the customer to do this and TP will have to change. [Didn't Craft(y) say the opposite in his report.]
11) this is all part of Transpoint's problem with billers where all the billers data goes into TP's Denver data center; the billers are paranoid, wanting control over this data without giving it up to Transpoint's computer.
12) with several billers like American Express, CKFR has an electronic reversibility agreement in case the customer doesn't have good funds in his bank account.
13) with billers which they don't have reversibility, they will cut a paper check for clients where they think a bounced check is possible.
14) they have a link with Experion (sp.?) to evaluate creditworthiness in any questionable circumstance.
15) Transpoint could not use Citi's pay anyone feature because it was an interior system geared to one bank where the funds could be immediately verified. Citi established almost no account info with billers outside the Northeast corridor while this can only work with a nationwide system. Citi doesn't have the reversibility agreements and credit checks CKFR has established in points 13) and 14) above.
16) some control-freak banks are upset that CKFR is using portals for ebill, while others are delighted to have the portals act as their internet interface and avoid more brick-and-mortar costs.
17) at their user meeting two weeks ago, a Mr. Tapscott(sp.?) told the banks that they will all be disintermediated by portals and that the only question is which banks will be smart enough to reintermediate by portal acceptance and linkage.
18) a few years back, CKFR worked with ADP to develop business-to-business ebills, but found it so difficult it was back-burnered; now it has been replaced on the front burner. Business billing is considerably more complex than consumer, what with net discounts, damage credits and timing problems (more preagreements are needed on standards). If Checkfree can find solutions through the front-end and pipeline as well as they can handle the back-end, they can capture this business.
P.S. My date tonite (whence this had to be split into two parts) had an interesting experience with CKFR. She is in-house lawyer to a mutual fund with its own bank. When a Checkfree lawyer wanted her to remit money from a fraudulent check which went thru CKFR's ACH system, she said she would have to have a court order or her org. could be sued. When the CKFR lawyer called back asking her how they should word the subpoena to her, she said they should have their own legal dept. determine how to sue her. Great try by our CKFR'er to save some legal expenses. |
