Payment Assistant for Vendors

For vendors, Payment Assistant also ensures they have a positive experience. Payment Assistant aims to be more convenient and efficient for both your organization and for vendors. As part of our commitment to drive efficiency and eliminate paper checks, we believe this feature will enhance your experience with us and your time spent paying vendors. On this topic, review the Payment Assistant experience from the vendor perspective.

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.

Vendor onboarding

The first time you include a payment for a vendor's invoice in a Payment Assistant payment run, the vendor will be contacted by our partner, REPAY, to enroll in the Payment Assistant disbursement process. They can expect a real person to call (from 801-679-6044 or 801-762-8772) or an 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.

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.

This step is required for the vendor to select their preferred payment delivery method for use with Payment Assistant, regardless of any previous settings they have set up with your organization in Financial Edge NXT.

In that communication, the vendor picks their preferred payment delivery method. 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.

  • 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.

  • ACH payments are processed automatically and are shown as paid within a few days.

  • Checks are printed and are shown as open until the check clears the bank. This usually take approximately 7-10 business days.

If the vendor selects ACH and you have selected to share EFT banking information, Payment Assistant will then use that banking information to enroll the vendor in Payment Assistant ACH payments. For more information, see Payment Assistant™ Settings. If you do not share EFT banking, the vendor needs to provide REPAY with additional documentation to get set up. A Payment Assistant agent will send the vendor an authorized form. The form can be signed via DocuSign and then they'd 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.

Tip: 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.

Once 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 from your payment run.

Required vendor record information

Invoice number, vendor address (including city, state, and zip), vendor customer number, and vendor phone number are required. Vendor contact email is optional, but strongly encouraged.

If any vendor info is missing, you need to update the vendor record with the required info before processing the payment with Payment Assistant.

Reissuing payments

There are no costs when canceling or reissuing payments. And, if there is any concern with fraud, you can contact Blackbaud Customer Support as soon as the issue is detected. Blackbaud and our vendors take fraud very seriously. Payment Assistant will cover lost funds due to fraud.

Updating preferred payment method

Yes, vendors can update their preferred payment method. We recommend vendors reach out to our Payment Assistant partner, REPAY, to update their preference.

To contact REPAY, call 801-679-6044 or 801-762-8772, or email payableshelp@repay.com.