If you are evaluating your company’s payment software and communication workflows, you need to look not only at existing processes, but at the tools you’re using to engage customers.

Many managers have inherited payment software solutions they never would have chosen or don’t fully understand how to use. This causes problems in an organization from expensive or inefficient processes to redundant functionality and using the wrong tool for the job.

As with any changes you make to your business workflows, you should start with the end goal in mind. Ask yourself, what is the root cause of the problem I’m trying to solve? What part of my process needs changing and what can stay the same? Perhaps most importantly, what is my end goal in switching payment software or changing processes?

It’s essential to create tailored goals specific to your organization. However, most of the workflows you execute to engage customers and take payments should fall into three main goal categories.

If you want to stay in business you need to treat your customers right. This is something every company agrees with in principle but many can’t seem to follow through.

The secret, though, is that within the context of digital engagement and collecting payments, what people want is not that hard. Customers want a fast, no-hassle way to interact with your company if needed and quickly pay their bill through the channel they prefer. What to keep in mind:

• Customers should be able to use your software with little or no trouble.

• You should have flexible options for every type of customer, so they can all interact with you the way they prefer.

• Digital workflows should be easy to navigate and fast to complete.

• You shouldn’t expect customers to remember logins and passwords to complete basic tasks like receiving and signing a document or paying a bill.

Another reason to make changes to your payment communication workflows is for your employees. Technology has given us the opportunity to do more tasks during each workday without the headaches of doing everything by hand.

Embrace this opportunity and look for ways your software will make things easier for staff.

• Your employees should be able to do their job as easily as possible. Shop for software that simplifies staff workflows or offers automation solutions.

• Look for tools that eliminate likelihood of errors, like sensitive documents being accessed by the wrong party.

• Security features make it easier to maintain payment processing compliance.

With the amount of choices available today – especially for online payment processing software – it can be difficult to know which vendors to choose. Some shoppers get so overwhelmed they are still putting off the choice to update office processes with payment collection software.

Manual payment workflows are slower and make it harder for customers to complete a transaction.

While old business tactics can still work, there are better alternatives to make work easier for your employees. Avoiding technology makes your company slower and shows customers you’re not able to keep up with trends.

Refusing to keep up with digital communication strategy will harm your business. On the other hand, you can’t let your love of technology overcomplicate tasks for your staff. Common issues with overuse of technology:

• It’s expensive and harms your bottom line.

• Multiple tools mean more logins to keep track of.

• Harder access to things like reporting and reconciliation, as information may be spread across multiple systems.

• Cycles of training and adoption are disruptive. They make it difficult for staff to maintain routines and build skill in their positions.

• Too much churn in daily workflows makes it difficult to monitor what parts of a process are working and which need to be optimized.

• The more software you adopt, the more Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) you will need to add to your policy and procedure documents. This increases the chance of human error during customer interactions, which leads to dissatisfaction and complaints.

Once you have a new software set up, it’s tempting to forget about it and move onto the next item on your to-do list. This can be harmful for workflows and cause big problems down the line.

Someone in your organization should be in charge of setting up and maintaining each software you use. Hire or train a digital strategist to consistently monitor how processes are working. If you don’t:

• you run the risk of small issues corrupting your workflows.

• you force front line staff to waste time creating workarounds for bad processes.

• you create confusion with staff who need training, have questions or feel like they are on their own to create solutions to problems caused by software.

Sutton Law Center and Corporate Direct Inc., (both owned by attorney Garret Sutton), like many companies, were using Docusign to send documents and collect digital signatures.

The software was chosen and implemented before Information Systems Manager, Melissa Matheson, was part of the decision making team. Docusign, like many other big name or enterprise softwares, can be expensive. So she began looking for a new solution.

Matheson originally wanted to find a more affordable option to gather digital signatures on client documents. In her search, she discovered PDCflow offers the document delivery and esignature process she needed along with payment software functionality to combine multiple steps into a single workflow.