Onboarding with Payment Assistant

Welcome to Payment Assistant — your streamlined solution for vendor payments directly within Financial Edge NXT®. With virtual card payments, accelerated ACH processing, and remote check printing, Payment Assistant helps you pay vendors quickly, securely, and reliably. By automating invoice payments, it frees up your time so you can focus more on your mission.

Payment Assistant is included in your Financial Edge NXT subscription and integrates Blackbaud’s technology with trusted payment processing from REPAY or BILL. The onboarding steps depend on which payment provider your organization uses.

Note: Payment Assistant™ is currently in Limited Availability (LA). Are you interested in participating? Apply to join our LA group. During this time, we'll review and implement participant feedback to prepare for general availability.

Which payment provider does your organization use?

Before You Sign Up for Payment Assistant

  • Talk to your auditor or financial stakeholders. Review how Payment Assistant fits into your organization's payment workflows.

  • With REPAY, vendor setup is required. By signing up, you agree that REPAY – Blackbaud's trusted payment partner – may contact each vendor in your payment run to confirm their preferred payment method. This applies to all vendors, regardless of prior arrangements.

  • With BILL, set up your vendors early. You can pay every vendor as soon as it exists in Financial Edge NXT, but setting vendors up before your first payment run helps BILL finish matching and bank verification sooner. Inviting vendors to the BILL Network is optional.

Learn about the vendor experience with Payment Assistant and vendor enrollment.

Complete Onboarding with REPAY

To use Payment Assistant with REPAY, complete the onboarding steps and Know Your Client (KYC) verification. After you submit the onboarding documents, you go live in 3-5 business days unless more documentation is required.

To get started:

  1. Complete the onboarding application.

  2. Verify your bank account. Submit a voided check, a recent bank statement, or a bank letterhead that includes your account details.

  3. Review and accept the Terms and conditions and Payment Services agreement.

  4. Notify your bank. To prevent ACH returns, provide REPAY’s ID 2820959731 and ask your bank to add it to their allow list.

Learn what information you need to complete the onboarding documents.

Complete Onboarding with BILL

Note: Don’t see this yet? The ability to use BILL with Payment Assistant is currently in an Early Adopter Program (EAP) for some of our customers. Look for full support and general availability in a future release.

Note: If your organization currently processes Payment Assistant payments through REPAY, switch from REPAY to BILL before you begin.

To use Payment Assistant with BILL, complete the onboarding steps on the Getting Started page, including BILL’s Know Your Client (KYC) review.

To get started:

  1. Enter your primary contact information and accept the Payment Assistant terms and conditions.

  2. Enroll with BILL. Complete your organization’s enrollment through BILL’s hosted enrollment experience, including BILL’s KYC review.

  3. Link BILL bank accounts to Financial Edge NXT. Match each bank account BILL has on file to its Financial Edge NXT bank account.

  4. Verify your Blackbaud billing account. Confirm that your organization has a billing bank account on file with Blackbaud. This account is separate from your BILL bank accounts.

  5. Review your EFT sharing settings.

  6. Assign permissions to the users who approve payment runs.

  7. Set up approval tiers.

  8. Review the approver notification settings.

  9. Enroll vendors with BILL. This step is optional but recommended.

  10. Select Start processing payments with Payment Assistant.

Link BILL Bank Accounts and Verify Your Blackbaud Billing Account

Payment Assistant with BILL involves three kinds of bank accounts, and each one has a different job:

  • Funding accounts — The bank accounts BILL debits to fund your vendor payments. You add and verify them with BILL. In Payment Assistant, you see them as BILL bank accounts when you link them to Financial Edge NXT.

  • Financial Edge NXT bank account links — The match between each BILL bank account and a bank account in Financial Edge NXT. Payment Assistant needs these links to process payments correctly. You create them in Payment Assistant, not in BILL.

  • Blackbaud billing account — The bank account on file with Blackbaud billing. You confirm it from Blackbaud billing settings, not in BILL, and it isn't one of your funding accounts.

Link BILL Bank Accounts to Financial Edge NXT

This step unlocks after you submit your BILL enrollment. You match each BILL bank account to its Financial Edge NXT bank account and link at least one. Learn how to link BILL bank accounts.

If BILL needs to verify an account with a trial deposit, the account appears under Bank account verification. If none of your BILL bank accounts is ready and some are waiting for verification, the remaining steps stay locked until you verify one.

Verify Your Blackbaud Billing Account

This step unlocks after you complete the link step. Select it to open Blackbaud billing settings in a new browser tab, where you confirm or add your organization's billing bank account. When a billing bank account is on file, the step displays the bank name, account type, and the last digits of the account and routing numbers. This step doesn't verify or change your BILL bank accounts.

You need billing management access to complete this step, or you can be an organization admin. If you don't have access, ask someone who does. Learn about Payment Assistant security roles and permissions.

The remaining setup steps stay locked until a billing bank account is on file.

Learn more about what to expect during BILL enrollment. After you start processing payments, manage your funding accounts in BILL.