According to the research - which evaluated data from 8 million residential online consumers over an 18-month interval – the most significant linkage between billing and business benefits is evident among the so-called early tenure customers, namely those who have been using online billing and payments for less than 28 months.
The study also indicates that customers who receive paperless electronic bills via a company’s website or at a financial institution’s website, or who use recurring payments, are more profitable for the billing organisation. Among early-tenure customers, e-bill users were revealed to be 12.5 percent less likely to stop using the service, as well as 35 percent more likely to pay their bills on time, and purchase 20 percent more products than paper bill users. Also, automatic, recurring payment users are 14 percent less likely to switch banks or give up e-billing and 86 percent more likely to pay their bills on time.
From a cost perspective, the study highlights the importance of delivering e-bills not only via an organizations own website, but also via financial institution sites; this is due to the fact that the circumstances in which a bill is received impacts payment method. Among the survey participants, 74 percent of customers who receive an e-bill at a bank site pay using a deduction from their bank account, a low-cost form of payment. Also, 40 percent of customers who receive bills at a company’s website pay using a card-funded payment, a higher cost method of payment.
The study was commissioned by US financial services technology provider Fiserv and conducted by Aspen Marketing Services.
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