As you're already aware, accepting electronic payments from your customers is a crucial part of any business and a key feature of ServiceCore. Traditionally, your customers have been paying by cash or check, but both of those methods are time consuming for everyone involved and harder to track which can make accounting a pain.
If you've set a business goal for yourself to move as many customers as possible over to paying online, either via credit card or ACH, but you're unsure how to start that conversation with them, we have you covered! Check out our recommended conversation prompts below and watch the amount of open invoices go down.
Before You Start
Here are a few things to know before you continue:
- In order to offer electronic, online payments to your customers you'll need to apply for a merchant account through Fiserv (formerly CloverConnect). To learn more, please reach out to servicecorepay@servicecore.com.
- You do not need to be on the Pro Plan to offer electronic, online payments to your customers, but you and your customers won't have access to a Customer Portal as described in the Email Template below. To learn more about the Pro Plan and its Customer Portal feature, please reach out to customersuccess@servicecore.com.
- You can see how your customers can save their payment details via the Customer Portal here.
- Learn how to save your customers' payment details here.
- Learn how your customers can pay invoices online here.
Introducing Online Payments to Your Customers
If you're just starting to accept payments by credit card or ACH and you want to announce these new options to your customers, here's a suggested talk track for over-the-phone conversations/voicemail messages plus an email template.
TIP: Adjust the examples to match your business tone of voice and wording.
Talk Track for Phone Calls & Voicemails
"Hi [Customer], I wanted to let you know that we're now taking credit card and ACH payments for all of our rentals and service types. This means you can easily pay your invoice online with a credit or debit card or directly from your bank account. It's super quick and you don't have to think about mailing us a check or dropping off cash during a busy week. Do you mind providing me with your card information so I can save it to your profile for later use?"
Email Template
"Hello [Customer]!
We're excited to let you know that we're now accepting secure online payments to make things easier and faster for you!
Your can now pay your invoices by credit/debit card or directly from a checking account (ACH). No more mailing us checks or stopping by in person! All you have to do is go to a link in the invoice we send you and pay it online within minutes.
We use a secure payment system that protects your information and you'll get a receipt emailed to you once the payment has been submitted to us.
What's even better is that we also have a way to save credit/debit cards and banking information in your profile and automate payments on your open invoices. All you have to do is call our office to provide us with your information over the phone or log into your Customer Portal and enter/save your details there.
Sincerely,
[Business Name]"
Handling Your Customers' Objections to Paying Online
Depending on the demographics of your customers some of them may be hesitant to hand over their banking details after years of paying by cash or check.
This is totally understandable, but shouldn't keep you from modernizing your business processes and keeping up with the way the rest of the world does business with each other.
Below are a few concerns your customers may have and examples of how you might want to respond to each.
Objection: I don't like giving my credit/debit/ACH info over the phone/via email.
Response (if you're NOT on Pro Plan): In that case, I have some good news for you: you can drop by the office at any time and give us the info in person so we can save it in your profile. Do you need our address or hours to plan on doing that?
Response (if you ARE on Pro Plan): In that case, I have some good news for you: when you're ready to pay your next invoice, you can log into your Customer Portal on your computer and save your info directly in there without us ever having to see it.
Objection: I don't want my credit/debit/ACH info saved in my profile.
Response: While we do prefer saving your payment details, we don't require it so that's not a problem. When you get your next invoice there will be a link you can use to submit a one-time payment to us without saving your payment details. If you have a previous invoice handy I can show you where to find it, how does that sound?
Objection: I don't know how secure your system is. Can my billing details get hacked?
Response: I totally understand your concern around that. We use a payment processor called Fiserv that handles the actual transfer of money from your bank (both cards and ACH) to ours and they're certified to meet key federal and state regulations to ensure they're compliant with national security standards.
The platform we use to store your payment details is called ServiceCore and they're also compliant with national security standards to ensure the privacy and safety of your information, even from us! Once your details are saved to your profile we can only ever see the last four digits of your card info or bank account.
Objection: It's just easier to mail/drop off a check/cash OR I just don't see the point in changing what we've always done.
Response: I get that; you're already have a routine set up that works for you and sometimes change is difficult, even if it makes things easier for you in the long run. I do think it's worth considering the fact that paying online means no driving to us to pay an invoice, no waiting to see if a check gets lost in the mail and then more waiting on us to actually deposit the check and then even more waiting for the funds to be pulled from your account. Some of our other customers were also unsure about doing this at first, but now they love how quick and simple it is. It also helps us stay more organized around your billing and gets your jobs/services handled faster. Would you mind testing it out for an invoice or two and then we can see if switching back to cash/check is better?
If you have any questions, please reach out to our Support team through the chat widget on the bottom right of this page or by sending an email to servicecorepay@servicecore.com!