In March 2013 the Federal reserve announced that some ACH debit transactions would clear on the same day they are sent, quite a change from the two to three days most would have to wait in the past. This change doesn’t effect all ACH payments, but it does give us a glimpse into the future of ACH processing. There may come a day where payments will clear within the same day like other rival methods of payment. Same day clearing will be beneficial for many businesses, and could change the game for some payment transactions, mostly business-to-business transactions.
This change was being thought about more than two years ago. In 2011 NACHA, the Electronic Payments Association, formerly the National Automated Clearing House Association, proposed a group of rules called the Expedited Processing and Settlement amendment to their operating rules to change the time it took to clear certain ACH payments. This change would make it so the deadline for ACH payment processing would be earlier in the day, and could accept any and all ACH payments.
There are multiple benefits that same-day ACH payments pose for businesses. There is added security as well as saving time and money.
One of the main reasons that ACH payments don’t have a same day clearing is to provide a longer time to dispute ACH credits or debits. If ACH payments moved to clearing in one day, there would have to be more security so this could be something that wasn’t a worry for those using the service. This could be beneficial, and could potentially be one of the safest ways of paying. Credit and debit cards can be stolen, there’s no record for cash only payments, checks can be stolen and used to commit fraud, but with ACH payments they can’t be stolen and rarely can they be hacked into, as they are all online.
Another benefit that would come out of same day processing is time savings. When waiting for an ACH payment to clear, it can stop budgets regardless if someone is waiting to receive payment or waiting for the payment to go through to pay other vendors or for materials, or to balance the books. This would save businesses time, especially because ACH payments already save businesses time by providing them with the ability to schedule payments. ACH payments are also cheaper than other methods of payment, usually charging a flat rate for processing, unlike credit cards, which charge a percentage of the amount processed to the business.
Moving ACH payments to same-day clearing can benefit businesses by saving them time, money and adding security. If you are interested in using ACH payments and streamlining your payment processes, take a look at some of the payment solutions Piracle offers. Piracle is a company based in Utah that has created Create-A-Check which allows one to print their own checks on blank check stock, as well as create ACH payments. You can find out more at www.Piracle.com.