Aevi is a Business Reporter customer.
The growth of the Internet and e-commerce in recent years has introduced online merchants and customers to a whole new world of possibilities from a payments perspective. The digital world is based on the principles of connectivity and efficiency, creating a payment and payment system that is not only highly efficient and flexible, but also provides additional benefits in the form of data integration and knowledge for all its stakeholders.
But this efficiency and flexibility in digital payments has only served to highlight the cumbersome and outdated processes associated with in-person payments, which still account for a significant majority of transactions.
The current in-person payment process is a one-way communication path, based on rigid card payments that are also highly fragmented as a result of local adaptations and regulations. The payment devices themselves are limited by the specific quirks of local card processors, meaning merchants are tied to that provider and can't offer the payment flexibility that online customers enjoy. The whole analog design and legacy nature of in-person commerce dates back to the last century and is in desperate need of an overhaul.
The emergence of digital native generations who have grown up using internet technologies means this is no longer sustainable. Customers expect digital flexibility in the form of customer-centricity, seeing the once-static point of sale become a mobile interaction point that reaches them, allowing them to pay with their preferred payment method, rather than the that is offered on the market. Terminal.
We can find a good example in the field of mobility. What started with paying at the pump by credit card is currently expanding to digital payment methods, such as PayPal or BNPL. The move to electric vehicles will drive this shift even further, requiring mobility marketers to redesign their entire customer experience as the car becomes the point of interaction.
Merchants must react to changing customer behavior. The rise of digital payments and the lifestyle economy, which has been accelerated by the pandemic, means the lines between in-person and online payments are blurring. They need to link their in-person payments to their e-commerce offering to benefit from a single source of truth, regardless of how or where payments were made.
To do this, they must be able to consolidate transaction data across channels and territories, introduce and change partners, and implement new initiatives and features holistically. And this is where the analog nature and silo-based structure of in-person payments becomes its Achilles heel, resulting in high cost and drastically reduced speed of innovation. However, they are not the only ones struggling, as payment providers (both new entrants and more traditional ones, as well as Internet service providers and even acquirers as the go-to business facilitators) suffer from the same limitations.
Until now, all of them have had no choice but to accept the current situation, largely due to the physical presence of the terminal. Switching providers would mean replacing the terminal itself with another, resulting in inevitable delays and potential loss of business for merchants, as well as inconvenience for customers.
This is where orchestration comes into play. Previously only attributed to e-commerce, there is now an alternative platform available that brings digital flexibility to in-person commerce. Combining digital design principles and the latest cloud-based technologies with open standards (such as Android or nexo) and a partnership-based approach, the platform logically separates the payment terminal from back-end processing and secure card payments from value-added services data. .
In short, the platform eliminates the complexity associated with the physical nature of the payment terminal, dissolving the embedded connection between the terminal and the processor. This gives platform stakeholders the freedom to choose and exchange trading and processing partners without disrupting business operations, and to dynamically route payments and data across territories, channels, partners and endpoints.
Being able to take responsibility for their own wealth gives them the ability to digitally enhance their in-person payment flows, connect their e-commerce channel to their e-commerce channel, and use harmonized data exchange to ultimately create best solutions for their respective clients.
Since the platform addresses an industry challenge, it not only benefits merchants, but all providers in the payments value chain, from traditional acquirers to PSPs, Payfacs and Internet Service Providers. Everyone benefits from more streamlined operations, improved processing stability, significant cost reductions, faster time to market, improved business insights and access to innovation.
Offering such flexibility around in-person payment means suppliers can quickly grow their customer base, even by moving to other countries. Merchants will also find it much easier to expand internationally without having to rely on a local payments provider or an acquirer operating in a silo. Fundamentally, it allows them to adapt their payment experiences to an ever-changing customer mindset in a very flexible and fast way.
The lines between in-person and online payments are blurring. It's time for payment service providers to catch up and position themselves to offer the kind of flexibility seen in digital payments in the physical world, offering more meaningful solutions for merchants and growing their own business in the process.
To learn more about how Aevi's platform could help your business, visit aevi.com.
