B2B Payment Gateway

A Payment Gateway vs Payment Processor

Many, if not all payment processors, such as Stripe and Bluesnap, are both payment processors and payment gateways. But it is important to understand that these are two separate functions necessary to transmit customer payments securely to your business.

These two functions are a:

• Payment gateway. Payment gateways transmit confidential payment cards and other sensitive payment data between the customer, your business, and each of your respective banks.
• Payment processor. The payment processor actually takes the payment data from the payment gateway and works with both the customer’ bank and your bank to transfer the payment to your account.

Key Components of a B2B Payment Gateway

B2B payment gateways are generally part of a comprehensive B2B payment automation service that includes invoice processing, payment workflows, payment execution, payment reconciliation and reporting and analytics.

As a stand-alone product, however, online payment gateways typically:

• Help facilitate a variety of payment methods. A B2B payment gateway should securely transmit payment information from different payment methods, including: debit and credit cards, local bank transfer, ACH/echeck, wire transfer and electronic funds transfer. This makes it more convenient for customers to pay and enhances the customer experience.

• Offer security and fraud prevention. The payment gateway process includes strict security measures such as encryption, multi-factor authentication and tokenization to protect sensitive payment data. These security measures ensure that the payment gateway meets compliance and regulations such as PCI DSS and GDPR. It typically also includes various measures such as real-time monitoring and automatic payment blocking for any suspicious activity.

• Integrate with other business technology. In addition to connecting with payment processors, B2B payment gateways can also connect with ERPs, accounting software, your B2B customer payment portal and A/R management and automation platforms. These integrations help it to automate and streamline both the payment process and the entire A/R lifecycle.

• Track and report payment history. Many payment gateways also track and record payments to generate insights such as preferred payment methods, geographic areas, chargebacks and refunds and cash flow analysis on a macro level. When connected to an A/R management and automation platform, it can also track unpaid, overdue and late invoices.

How Gaviti Helps to Streamline the B2B Payment Process

Although the B2B payment process is a critical element of the accounts receivable process, it is just one component of accounts receivables. Gaviti’s invoice-to-cash A/R management and automation platform helps to streamline not only customer payment of receivables with the integration of payment gateways and its Self-Service Payment Portal, but the entire accounts receivable lifecycle.

It’s modules include:

• Collections Analytics. Track different KPIs related to A/R, including Total A/R, DSO, Collections rate, customer risk, etc. Generate comprehensive reports that include performance over time, identify bottlenecks in the process, and implement targeted improvements to reduce DSP, improve cash flow and optimize collections strategies.
• Self-Service Payment Portal. Enhance the customer experience by enabling various payment methods for customers and the ability to pay receivables 24/7. The Portal includes payment gateway integration with payment processors such as BlueSnap and Stripe.
• Cash Application. Eliminate the need for manual matching and support both automatic and semi-automatic payment and their reconciliation. Connect to multiple banks to enable automatic payment reconciliation and precise cash allocation to improve your cash flow management.
• Credit management and monitoring. Automate the credit request and approval process and credit limit setting. Continually update customer credit limits and get alerts about customers with increased credit risk with data from the Collections Analytics module.

Want to learn more about how Gaviti can help you streamline the entire A/R process? Speak to a Specialist!

See why Gaviti is ranked as the #1 Credit & Collections Software on G2: