LOCAL COMPANY PROVIDES ALTERNATIVE
TO MAILING OF BILLS
With terrorist Anthrax mail scare, more businesses and membership organizations seeking to avoid mailroom threats turn to local company for efficient business substitute.

Since September 11th, ACH Direct has realized a noticeable increase in new business. Many traditional business methods have been challenged to accommodate the needs of physical and financial security. Suddenly, bio-terrorism is now forcing us all to rethink the conventional models of handling common mail. ACH Direct is providing interesting solutions to companies large and small who are seeking to eliminate or reduce mailroom exposure.

What's in your mail? Besides unsolicited advertising and the occasional letter from a friend or loved one, you are most likely going to find bills in your mail. Businesses send invoices and customers make payments to pay their bills by putting a check in a return envelope. This customary model of payment is now suspect not only as an issue of inefficiency, it is now a questionable matter of security, trust… and Health.

For some, there has become a legitimate fear of opening the mail as they realistically wonder if bio-contamination has occurred.

ACH Direct provides a convenient alternative to a business mailing recurring invoices, with customers mailing payments back. The alternative is known as EFT or Electronic Funds Transfer. This is accomplished through the nationwide system of ACH, the Automated Clearing House and is regulated by the Federal Reserve.

ACH Direct is a local business located in the Coachella Valley that has been providing these services for the last four years to financial institutions and small businesses nationwide; one high-profile example-DirectTV. ACH Direct automatically processed a total of over one billion dollars in electronic transactions in fiscal 2000 for a variety of businesses all across the nation.

Electronic Funds Transfer is accomplished with ACH Direct's DirectBilling product. This easy to use solution provides for businesses an automatic method to process recurring billing that is "hands-free" …by performing debits and credits through the ACH network. For many customers this totally eliminates the receiving of a bill and having to make a payment by putting a check in the mail. Instead, scheduled payments are made automatically. This is the logical, proper solution to eliminate the threat of mail contamination for both the business and the customer.

The costly and tedious mailroom processing of mailing and invoices and receiving payments is eliminated with the alternative of electronic billing. With DirectBilling there is no more mail to send or receive. Payments are processed electronically as funds are scheduled and withdrawn automatically from the customer's account and transferred into the merchant's account. An immediate benefit to the merchant is that this also eliminates handling of NSF checks.

ACH Direct provides DirectBilling services to nationwide customers including DirectTV, schools, membership organizations, healthcare institutions, doctors, accountants, financial institutions, manufacturers and utilities. Other ACH Direct products include InternetChecks, and DirectRecovery of NSF Checks.

Recent events that have compromised our nation's mail delivery and service have generated a strong interest in ACH Direct products. Small merchants, membership organizations and institutional operations are embracing this technology. This is a technology that is not new; it is tested, tried and true. It is also an industry that is accountable and regulated by the Federal Reserve of the United States.

ACH Direct, a local high technology company in the Coachella Valley, provides a secure business solution that is having a positive impact on keeping American businesses running smoothly without interruption; independent of any terrorist's biological contamination or potential compromising of mail billing services.
                                              TOP

NACHA RULES FOR E-CHECKS EFFECTIVE SEPTEMBER 14th
Consumers will be able to make e-check payments over the telephone under new rules from NACHA - The Electronic Payments Association that became effective on September 14, 2001. The new rules permit merchants, billers and government agencies to offer e-checks by telephone as a payment option.
"An e-check authorized over the telephone is an easy and convenient option for consumers to make payments," said Elliott C. McEntee, President and CEO of NACHA. "A consumer paying a bill or making a purchase would have an alternative to mailing a check."

An e-check is an electronic debit to a checking account that is initiated on the Internet, at the point-of-sale, over the telephone, or even by a bill payment sent through the mail. An e-check is processed using the Automated Clearing House (ACH) Network, and typically takes 1-2 business days to be posted to a checking account. Under the new rules, a consumer can verbally authorize an e-check payment by telephone. The authorization is either tape-recorded or a written confirmation notice is sent to the consumer.

E-checks by telephone are covered by the Federal Reserve's Regulation E, which defines specific consumer protections from error and fraud. There are no similar protections for paper check payments. NACHA's rules for e-checks by telephone follow the Federal Trade Commission's telemarketing sales rule, and provide an additional consumer protection by specifically prohibiting companies that cold-call consumers from using e-checks for any resulting sales.

Since July 1999, NACHA has been conducting a pilot program to test e-checks by telephone. From its inception through July 2001, the latest month for which statistics are available, the pilot has originated more than 10.5 million e-checks. The NACHA Operating Rules standardize payment formats for the ACH Network, and define the rights, obligations and warranties of parties involved in ACH payments. Operating rules provide a uniform business and legal framework for the exchange of payments, which enhances participants' confidence in the safety and reliability of the payments system.

The ACH Network serves 20,000 financial institutions, 3.5 million businesses, and 100 million individuals. The ACH Network is commonly used for Direct Deposit of payroll and government benefits such as Social Security, Direct Payment of consumer bills, business-to-business payments, federal tax payments, and, increasingly, e-checks and e-commerce payments. In 2000 there were 6.9 billion ACH payments made worth more than $20 trillion.
                                              TOP

CONSUMER OPINION FAVORABLE ON POINT-OF-PURCHASE
More than one in four consumers, who write checks for goods and services, are aware of the ACH application Point-of-Purchase (POP), according to a survey conducted by NACHA, The Electronic Payments Association.
POP allows an Originator (merchant or biller) to use the ACH Network to initiate a one-time ACH debit entry to a consumer account for the in-person purchase of goods or services. A check/sharedraft is used as a source document to capture the consumer's account information for the origination of the entry.

Seventy percent of those surveyed had actually experienced the application in person. Of those, a majority had a favorable opinion towards the application for one of two reasons:

· lower costs being passed on from the merchant to the consumer due to the fact that ACH transactions are less expensive to process than paper; and

· fewer people handle the item because it is electronic, decreasing the chance for fraud.

Other advantages acknowledged were quicker checkout lines, instant confirmation of the transaction and more specific information on monthly statements.
                                              TOP

FEDERAL RESERVE PUBLISHES REGULATION E STAFF COMMENTARY
The Federal Reserve Board has published significant revisions to the Regulation E (Electronic Fund Transfers) Official Staff Commentary. The revisions provide guidance on electronic check conversion transactions when a consumer authorizes the use of a check to capture information for initiating an electronic debit from the consumer's account. Guidance is also provided on electronic authorizations permitting recurring debits from a consumer's account and other issues. The commentary is intended to help financial institutions comply with Regulation E when they offer electronic fund transfer services to consumers.

Under the final rule, where a consumer authorizes a one-time EFT from the consumer's account using information from a check to initiate the transfer, Regulation E covers the transaction. The result is the same whether the check is blank, partially completed, or fully completed and signed; whether the check is presented at the point of sale or mailed to a merchant or lockbox and later converted to an EFT; or whether the check is retained by a consumer, the merchant or the merchant's financial institution.

The final rule also provides that Regulation E covers computer-initiated payments, unless the agreement with the consumer expressly states that all payments will be made by check, draft or similar paper instrument.
The effective date is March 15 2001; however, to allow time for any necessary operation changes, the mandatory compliance date is January 1, 2002. The Board's announcement and the final rule can be found at www.federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/press/boardacts/2001/20010313.

                                              TOP

NACHA STATISTICS FOR 2000
Automated clearing house (ACH) payments totaled almost 6.9 billion in 2000, according to statistics released today by NACHA - The Electronic Payments Association at its PAYMENTS 2001 conference.

"In 2000 the ACH Network continued the robust growth that occurred every year during the 1990s. Annual commercial ACH volume is 580 percent higher than 10 years ago," said Janet C. Boyst, Chair of NACHA's Board of Directors and Senior Vice President and Group Executive at Wachovia Bank. "As established ACH products such as Direct Deposit and Direct Payment continue to grow, ACH providers are offering new products for retail payments, bill and invoice payments, e-commerce payments, and international payments. As new methods of conducting commerce evolve, the ACH Network is well-positioned to continue to serve the needs of businesses, individuals and the government to move money."

ACH payments for 2000 totaled 6.88 billion, up 12.4 percent from the 6.12 billion payments reported for 1999. The dollar amount of the transactions grew from $19.0 trillion in 1999 to $20.3 trillion in 2000, a 6.5 percent increase. ACH payments include Direct Deposit of payroll, Social Security benefits and tax refunds, Direct Payments of mortgages, car loans, insurance, utility and other bills, business-to-business payments, federal tax payments, electronic checks, and, increasingly, eCommerce payments.

                                              TOP

USE OF DIRECT DEPOSITS HITS RECORDS
NEW ORLEANS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 10, 2001--It's not often that a business can increase security, save money, raise productivity and make employees happy in one fell swoop. Direct deposit of payroll checks achieves all of these objectives. In other words, you don't have to take that check to the bank.

May 14-18 has been declared ``Direct Deposit and Direct Payment Week'' by Louisiana Gov. Mike Foster and other elected officials across the country in order to promote awareness of the benefits of these programs to employers and workers alike. Direct deposits can include payroll, expenses, pension and annuity payments, interest payments, retirement and mutual fund distributions, Social Security and other government transfers, tax refunds and stock dividends.

Frady points out key advantages to workers and employers of all sizes:

-Employers can save up to $1.25 per paycheck, offsetting any lost ``float,'' according to NACHA studies. The U.S. Government reports that it saves 41 cents with every direct deposit.

-Direct deposit combats check fraud, estimated to cost businesses more than $10 billion annually.

-Use of direct deposit hit record levels in 2000, increasing 7.75% in one year to 3.3 billion transactions, totaling almost $3 trillion, NACHA reported.

-Some 100 million Americans relied on direct deposit to receive payments or government benefits in 2000, according to NACHA. More than half of U.S. workers use direct deposit for paychecks, and 97% of those say they are ``very satisfied'' with the service. Also, 55% of all consumers use some form of direct deposit, including 75% of Social Security recipients.

-Direct deposit increases productivity by eliminating the estimated 16 to 30 hours per year that each employee needs to cash or deposit paychecks.

-Employees value direct deposit as a benefit, trailing only insurance in importance, according to a study released in April by the National Payment Corp. of Tampa, Fla.

In the National Payment Corp. survey, workers ranked direct deposit even with 401(k) programs and behind only health, life and dental insurance. Their leading reasons for valuing direct deposit were the convenience of avoiding trips to the bank, the ability to access funds and accrue interest immediately, the knowledge that the check was deposited and the elimination of loss or theft. Of workers whose employers did not offer direct deposit, 71% said they would use it if it were offered. Source: Yahoo
                                              
 TOP

Call or Email Us today for a free evaluation or information.