US electronic payments association Nacha has formed a corporate payments council to promote greater use of electronic business-to-business (B2B) payments.
Nacha says the corporate payments council will bring together stakeholders in the wholesale payments arena to develop software and best practices that will increase use of electronic B2B payments.
Elliott McEntee, president and CEO, Nacha, says while electronic B2B payments increase by double digits every year, an estimated 80% of all B2B payments are still made by cheque.
"The movement to electronic payments in the B2B realm is happening only incrementally as compared to consumer payments, where more payments are made electronically than by cheque," adds McEntee.
The council will work with companies, financial institutions and industry groups on straight-through processing (STP), remittance information formats and standards, corporate payables best practices for ACH credit origination, risk management and compliance issues including OFAC, USA Patriot Act and other regulations.
The total number of B2B payments over the ACH Network grew by 12.4% in 2002 to 1.6 billion, and comprised 17.4 percent of all ACH payments.