10 Great B2B Bill Payment Systems Depending on Business Need

In business, companies might sometimes try foolishly to be everything to every customer, promising they can help anyone who comes their way.

The truth, however, is that not every business can help every customer. Same goes for B2B bill payment systems, where the best system will depend on a business’s size, preference, and various idiosyncratic factors. What works for a small mom-and-pop operation might not be ideal for an enterprise-level firm. And companies might not need just one payment system – they might use three or four (or a lot more) based on their customer ecosystem.

Today, we’re going to look at 10 different B2B bill payment systems for accounts payable, separating them out by who they serve best.

Top B2B Bill Payment Systems for Business Class

First, let’s look at the best types of B2B bill payment systems by business class, or the size or profile of the companies using them.

Best for Mid-Sized or Enterprise-Level Businesses, or Small Businesses that Process a Lot of Invoices: Stampli

Stampli is an all-in-one, software-as-a-service (SaaS) AP automation platform that companies use from transaction or invoice all the way through invoice approval or invoice payment. Stampli is flexible to meet every company’s unique accounting needs and designed to scale with companies as they grow, making it an excellent choice for growing businesses, mid-market companies, and beyond.

The Stampli system uses artificial intelligence, via Billy the Bot, to push and pull information to and from accounting systems, perform three-way matching of purchase orders, invoices, and receipt reports, and catch (and often resolve) invoice exceptions. It’s a cutting-edge AP automation platform, utilizing AI to reduce invoice processing times and minimize costs for any company still doing manual accounting work.

What sort of company isn’t a good fit for Stampli? Companies that process a small volume of invoices may not quite be ready for a full AP automation and B2B bill payment solution. Although there are exceptions, and while Stampli is an exceptional software for any size company, value is more commonly experienced with invoice volume.

Best for Small Businesses or Freelancers: Payoneer

A lot of small businesses might opt for payment giants such as PayPal or Stripe for the simple sake that they’re a big name or it’s what their suppliers want. In a 2021 study by Stampli and Treasury Webinars, “How & Why Companies Choose Payment Types” 37% of companies chose payment types due to supplier preference.

But arguably lesser-known names can also work well for small businesses or freelancers, companies like Payoneer which are focused on helping them, as Payoneer CEO Scott Galit recently told PYMNTS. “We need to continue to help SMBs take advantage of some of the opportunities that they have in the connected economy,” Galit said. “If we do, we’re going to see many more of them pursue these opportunities and succeed.”

Freelancers can operate on tight margins, particularly in the early parts of their careers. And many might move around the globe, welcoming the chance to not be stuck in any one place too long. Accordingly, Payoneer is great for remote and international contractors, with its website noting that it allows payment in dollars, Euros, pounds, and more. It also caps fees at 1% for American clients and waives them for international ones.

Best for High-Risk Payers: PaymentCloud

One of the more dispiriting things that can happen with PayPal is when it puts a freeze on a payment, or even an entire account, sometimes as long as six months. Reasons can vary, though it can have to do with the level of risk that PayPal’s algorithm assigns to a transaction and getting it resolved can be a frustrating, uncertain process.

For anyone who might not sell frequently to B2B customers on PayPal, have stellar credit, or be worried about any other factors that might delay transactions, seeking out a payment provider willing to offer a little more wiggle room can be useful. One of these is PaymentCloud, which offers a High Risk Merchant Account that includes rate review and mitigation for risk and chargebacks.

Effective Systems for Common B2B Payment Types

The right B2B bill payment systems can also be a matter of how a company prefers to pay its bills. And let’s be clear: There isn’t a right or wrong way to pay a bill, one reason Stampli Direct Pay is payment agnostic, allowing companies to pay their suppliers however they’d like.

Then when it comes to corporate credit cards, Stampli Card provides complete control and visibility over your corporate credit card spend as it is the only credit card solution integrated into the most powerful AP Automation platform.

Here are four more good payment options to consider.

Credit Card: Plastiq

More business payments get made by credit card than any other method, with Stampli and Treasury Webinars finding in its 2021 payment study that 36% of companies preferred to pay their suppliers this way. But not every vendor is friendly to credit cards, sometimes due to the high fees that can be associated with them. In these situations, Plastiq can be a good option.

Nerd Wallet wrote in April 2021 of how Plastiq was working with businesses to help them use cards with vendors who wouldn’t normally take them. The fees could be restrictive, the site noted, though it added, “But if you need some breathing room as you wait for a paycheck or windfall to arrive, Plastiq could be cheaper than a high-interest option like a cash advance or payday loan — assuming you can pay the bill off quickly, and especially if you use a rewards credit card that can defray the processing fee.”

Paper Check: Deluxe

Paper checks get hated on and to some degree, it’s justified. Checks can get lost in the mail, be susceptible to fraud, and cost more and take longer to process than other payment forms. Still, checks remain popular, being the preferred payment method for 30% of companies in Stampli and Treasury Webinars’ study with 34% of companies in that study making at least half their payments by check.

Sometimes, being successful with paper checks is about finding a processor that excels with them. One of these is Deluxe, whose lockbox service processes $2 trillion in paper check payments annually. It’s a rare B2B bill payment systems provider, too, not aggressively pressuring businesses to ditch checks or marketing digital payments as the solution to all of their problems.

“There is no silver bullet to transitioning that volume to electronic payment methods all at once – especially today when AR and AP teams are already managing an immense sense of disruption in remote working environments,” Deluxe noted on its website.

Ghost Cards: Kontrol

There might be the occasional customer who wants a virtual or ghost card payment. When this occurs, one place to potentially look is Kontrol, a Washington- based company of approximately 21 employees and around $4 million in revenue that operates a virtual card program. The company notes on its website that it offers “a proven payment technology platform, successfully used by more than 20,000 organizations to pay more than 1 million suppliers easily and securely.”

Good Systems for Niche Functionality

Sometimes, too, a company will choose its B2B bill payment systems based upon niche functionality. Here are a few good providers in this realm.

International Payments: Skrill

Cross-border payments aren’t always the easiest for companies to make, sometimes requiring large fees or unusual payment types to make it happen. Skill offers some flexibility with its business accounts, allowing customers to select from more than 40 currencies and working with 3,000 banks worldwide to allow rapid transfer.

Customers will also get a company with Skrill that’s been working to reinvent itself, after rebranding in November 2020 from Moneybookers, which Techcrunch described as a European alternative to PayPal. The company was hopeful at the time, with their CEO Martin Ott telling Techcrunch, “In the same way people ‘Google’ something or ‘Skype’ their friends, they can soon ‘Skrill’ their friends and family money and will use Skrill to pay whenever they shop online.”

Instant Payments: Tassat

Real-time, instant, and just generally faster payments have become more of a focus among B2B bill payment systems in recent years, with the window for same-day ACH payments being extended. That said, not every payment provider is ideally suited to move payments quickly. But Tassat can do instant payments via blockchain.

New York-based Customers Bank opted to integrate Tassat’s network in May 2020, with one of the bank’s executives telling PYMNTS, “The job of a bank, especially in today’s day and age, is to not only develop technology that can anticipate what a client may need in the future, but also think about where the puck is going.”

Payments with Billable Hour Tracking: Due

Anyone who’s tried to link invoicing and time tracking knows it can be a little wonky sometimes. This goes for both independent contractors creating invoices and companies that receive invoices with billable hours delineated on them and can’t always be sure if the billable time is just made up.

Due has sought to counteract the uncertainties with a time tracking tool that small businesses and freelancers primarily can use. The company notes on its site that the tool can speed invoice creation and even measure productivity by staff “for accurate and transparent timecards and to ensure labor law compliance.”

Overall, Due is just one more option among a surprisingly robust array of B2B bill payment systems.

It pays to have versatile B2B bill payment systems. See how Stampli Direct Pay’s flexibility helps companies excel.