How to automate recurring payment collection

1. Sign up to Subscribie (60-day money-back guarantee)
2. Enter your plan(s)
3. Direct customers/members to sign-up to your plans

We don't use typewriters anymore because they're slow and inefficient, so why do we keep manually sending invoices and manually processing recurring payments? It's time for an update.

Subscribie was built out of a need to collect money automatically from broadband customers, we later realised that collecting money on subscription is a general problem for a lot of businesses, especially small businesses. So we released the service as a way to collect recurring payments for any business, be it a Rugby Club collecting memberships or a Wine Club wanting to sell wine on subscription.

Fast forward a few years and we have exactly that- from Rugby Clubs to Wine Clubs to Gyms collecting their payments automatically- why are so many small business still doing so much manual work?

Are you still sending the same invoices month by month? This is pointless- and it's a hassle to find your customers too (or you if you're the one payment). If you're requesting the same payments from your customers month by month- it's probably good to set up a recurring subscription.

Collecting recurring payments is nothing new, your bank, utility company and mobile phone provider has been doing it for years- so why do we as smaller businesses still faff on sending / receiving invoices, logging into online banking and performing manual tasks like this? Some even hire additional staff to perform this role- this is madness.

We know that money collection securely is a major concern. Strong customer authentication is one way to improve this- in the consumer space this is why in recent years you're getting a text message from your bank before you pay for thinks online, or a notification from your banking app- these are all properties of strong customer authentication. We need the same thing for business to business payment automation.

Don't we already have this with 'pay links' in emails and 'click here to pay this invoice'? No, it's not the same as automating payments since there's still a lot of unnecessary manual tasks, especially if you're paying this invoice repeatedly. Imagine the following more frictionless scenario instead:

1. A client or customer you've been working with for years sends you an invoice (aka a request for payment)
2. You're happy with the work (it's complete or you're happy to pay)
3. You get a notification on your phone ("Are you happy to pay client x, £amount, yes / no")
4. If you tap 'yes', then confirm 'yes I'm sure'
5. Then the payment is made automatically, record of payment is made in the background
6. Job done

That's it. That's how automated payments should be. If it's a subscription, then of course you don't even need step 1, as subscriptions automatically generate invoices before being automatically charged, and a record is kept. This latter process is exactly what we've built at Subscribie to automate recurring payments. Simply create an account, enter the products or services you want to collect recurring payments for, and direct your customers to the sign-up page. Your customers or members sign-up themselves, can cancel their subscription, and you can also pause and review payments.