Chris Kronenthal from FreedomPay discusses the future of technology and leading the way in innovation in the retail industry Retail Technology Innovation Hub.

Orchestrating the Payment Processing Jungle Gym

In these tough times where value and service are key differentiators for retailers, managing the dizzying array of payment options can be daunting. From contactless to in-app, to account-to-account (A2A) payments, retailers must decide whether to rely on their banks, third-party processors, themselves, or a multitude of partners to cope with these real-time payment options.

Furthermore, retailers are faced with a deluge of data flying at them from loyalty schemes, personalized marketing strategies, and AI machine learning-enabled fraud detection and automated service systems. To handle this data, retailers must decide whether to use a microservices approach internally and containerization in their operations or leave it to third-parties to front-end it for them.

These are the types of questions that payment and data processors, like FreedomPay, are asked by retailers. The emphasis is often on pulling together all of the data from payment transactions to help a treasury, identifying customers better through marketing, and orchestrating various payment or credit options like buy now pay later (BNPL) while maintaining the operational requirement for interoperability.

Having clear people and money pathways is especially important in the payments area as shops want to take and encourage revenue easily. Retailers seek seamless payment journeys, BNPL options, or Amazon’s Palm Reader, Tap2Pay, or any other source while maintaining operational interoperability. The title with the most recent payments processing request for a proposal that has no old-fashioned language like gateway in it revolves around orchestration.

Payments, data-centric personalization, identity platforms, apps, stores, and more are now merging into an omnichannel approach where the customer is king. The customer wants an easy, quick, data-centric connected CX, and they don’t care how they get it. This new era of technology, known as the third generation of tech, is an open ecosystem where customers pick their own retailer for a pre-identified product with their own banking, payment, loyalty, and other such options catered in. This ecosystem is often powered by open API-powered means of easy data exchange.

“The first iteration of e-commerce was clunky. But from 2005 onwards, it got much more granular, albeit in a closed loop manner,” said FreedomPay’s principal technical architect, Ralph Kronenthal. The second generation of technology was about FinTechs, but retailers had to cope with numerous linkages. Now, customers prioritize convenience and desire a single super app that rules them all from their mobile phone app.

The future of more connected systems is bright. Consumers don’t want to submit their personal data, passwords, and so on to various standalone systems. Kronenthal’s vision for FreedomPay is delivering a holistic service to their end-point customers in retail, lodging, gaming, and other sectors.

However, each business must decide whether or not to outsource operations in part or whole. It depends on their internal resources, expertise, and orchestration capabilities.

In conclusion, retailers have many decisions to make when it comes to payment processing. There are many payment options to choose from, and there’s a deluge of data to manage. Whether to outsource payment processing or handle operations internally is a decision that each business must make for themselves. Regardless, orchestrating payment processing is crucial in providing seamless payment journeys and maintaining operational interoperability.

Editor Notes:

Payment processing can be an arduous task for retailers. However, with the advent of third-party payment and data processors like FreedomPay and their open API-powered means of easy data exchange, orchestrating payment processing is becoming more accessible. Not only does this benefit retailers by providing seamless payment journeys, but it also benefits the customer by providing an easy, quick, data-centric connected CX. To learn more about the future of payments technology, check out GPT News Room.

Source link