Vendor Onboarding with Payment Assistant
When a vendor is included in a Payment Assistant payment run for the first time, they’ll be contacted by REPAY — Blackbaud’s trusted payment partner — to enroll in the disbursement process. They can expect a person to call (from 801-679-6044 or 801-762-8772) or email (payableshelp@repay.com) as an agent of your organization. After the payment delivery method is agreed upon, Payment Assistant automates the rest of the contact.
Inform vendors in advance
It may be helpful to notify your vendors in advance that someone from REPAY will be reaching out to them. This can help prevent delays caused by miscommunication.
Use the following template to customize to your organization.
Vendors select their payment method
This step is required for the vendor to choose their preferred payment delivery method for use with Payment Assistant, regardless of any existing settings they may have previously configured in Financial Edge NXT.
In that communication, Payment Assistant first tries to set up a virtual card payment. If the vendor cannot accept virtual cards, Payment Assistant attempts to set up payment via ACH. And if the vendor does not accept virtual cards or ACH, Payment Assistant will issue a check and mail it to the vendor.
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Virtual card payments, the fastest, most secure, and preferred method of payment can be processed by the vendor as soon as they receive the email, and are shown as paid within a few days of processing.
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ACH payments are processed automatically and are shown as paid within a few days.
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Checks are printed and are shown as open until the check clears the bank. This usually take approximately 7-10 business days.
Tip: If vendors do not respond to Payment Assistant's attempts to contact, we do not hold their funds. After the 1 day business hold is up on their funds, we send the payments by check. The next time a vendor has a payment, Payment Assistant attempts to contact the vendor again to set up their preferred payment method.
If a vendor selects ACH as their payment method and you’ve enabled EFT sharing, Payment Assistant will use the existing banking information to enroll the vendor. For more details, see EFT Sharing with Payment Assistant . If EFT sharing is not enabled, the vendor will need to provide REPAY with additional documentation to complete their setup. A Payment Assistant agent will send the vendor an authorized form. The form can be signed via DocuSign. Then they need to attach proof of their bank account. This proof can be a bank voided check, a bank letterhead signed form, or a snippet of their bank statement.
Note: We know that prompt payments are critical to your success! Therefore, we never hold a payment to allow time for the vendor to submit their required documentation. After the 1 day business hold is up on their funds, we send the payments. If a vendor hasn't completed ACH enrollment, a check is sent the first time and then they'll receive ACH for future payments.
After the preferred payment delivery method has been selected, Payment Assistant emails the vendor with payment and invoice information from your payment run. Unique emails are generated for ACH, check, and virtual card payments so they are specific to how your vendor is getting paid.