What are a few ways for entrepreneurs to decrease risk? You will not get a precise answer to this question with a Google search. Instead, you need to assess the risks by talking to experts on different elements of the business first. Risks associated with the various components of the company vary in their severity. On the payment front, a significant risk can leave you bankrupt and personally liable for all your investors’ losses. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) study shows that people lost over $3.3 Billion just in 2020 alone!
This series of blogs discusses the basics of entrepreneurship that every new business owner should consider when starting a new venture.
Part 1: 7 Things an Entrepreneur Must Assume When Starting a Business
Part 2: Created a New Business Plan? Do This Next!
Part 3: New Entrepreneurs Must Master These 4 Skills
Part 4: 7 Ways for Entrepreneurs to Decrease Risk on Payments
In the final part, we talk about 7 ways entrepreneurs can decrease their risk on payments.
7 Ways for Entrepreneurs to Decrease Risk on Payments
#1 Partner with a Reliable Payments Processor
When you start a business, you partner up with several vendors. These partners can help you with your software, workforce, utility, production, payment, etc., requirements. Choosing the right payment partner will help you minimize the business risk by transferring a host of responsibilities to a reliable third party. The best payment processors will often take up a significant chunk of the overall responsibility to facilitate seamless money transfers. Ideally, you should always rely on a Nacha-certified payments processor to adopt ACH solutions for payment processing.
#2 Adopt Secure Technologies
The top payment processors go an extra step to offer supplemental security to their customers. They minimize risk by adding multiple layers of encryption on your transactions so that no one except you has complete access to your data. These payment processing partners can help you set up a merchant account so that you can start your operations as soon as possible. They will also fortify your existing payments network and help you offer multiple modes of money transfer to your customers.
#3 Collect An Additional Layer of Information
Intelligent business owners often reduce the risk of payment transfers by collecting all possible relevant information from their vendors/customers beforehand. However, most small enterprise owners do not have a way to collate data from multiple sources of information efficiently at scale. Reliable processors help you customize data collection forms so that you can collect this additional layer of information from your customers while processing ACH and credit card payments.
#4 Automate Payment Schedules
Automation is one of the best ways for organizations to decrease risk and increase trust with their customers/vendors. With automated payment schedules on the ACH network, business owners can collect and send recurring payments without lifting a finger. Moreover, ACH offers this automated facility at more affordable prices than other online money transfer methods.
Apart from ACH payment solutions, your payments processor should ideally offer additional security on online payments made through IVR and hosted payment portals for entrepreneurs to decrease their cyberfraud risk, too. The FTC report shows that telephone was the primary contact method in 31% of the registered fraud cases.
#5 Track Bank Statements Regularly
If your type of business involves conducting hundreds of returnable transactions every day, you should have systems in place to track bank statements regularly. Keeping tabs on your bank statements will help you identify and report fraud in real-time. Using accounting software like Quickbooks, payment gateways can seamlessly integrate to allow oncoming payments, whether by ACH or credit card, to post within the software service. Learn more about accounting software developer plugins.
#6 Get Your Problems Fixed ASAP
Ideally, you should always keep an open line of communication with your payment processor to minimize the overall risk involved in payments. If you detect a fraudulent entry on your statements, you should reach out to your processor and get it fixed as soon as possible. The best payment processors offer a single point of all payment solutions for your payment processing needs. In addition, they provide relationship management services so that you can reach the right person to report disparities as soon as you spot them.
#7 Collect Feedback from Customers
Studies show that the business strategy that relies on market research and regular collection of customer reviews does well in the long term. Also, it helps the business owners save money by offering customers exactly what they need. Some business owners deal with high-net-worth clients who are always concerned about the safety of their data. These customers do not mind paying a small premium to get additional peace of mind. With a strong payments processing partner, you can position yourself on social media as one of the safest vendors in the market.
A well-defined business plan considers the various risks involved while processing payments. So, if you want to know more about the business risks involved with the payments world, get in touch with our experts over a quick call. Our team helps entrepreneurs decrease risk and set up a seamless payment experience for their customers. Get in touch with our experts who have an excellent track record of helping customers get started with payments.
Date originally published: January 22, 2022