We know that e-billing is less expensive, more secure, and more environmentally responsible that paper billing. But we were a little bit surprised by thye results of Aspen Marketing's study on a company that gave customers the options of using EIPP or paper billing.

The study, which looked at records of 8 million customers at a large corporation, compared customers who chose online invoicing with those who chose to pay their bills by mail. This large study turned up some statistically significant differences between the two groups. 

First, e-bill users are more faithful. Paper bill users were 12.5 times more likely to leave for another service. Among those who had automatic recurring bills, the number was even higher -- they were 14% more faithful. Even though these consumers chose their method of payment, it's possible that e-invoices were convenient enough to give consumers a more positive feeling about the company -- perhaps without their analyzing the feeling much.

Second, those who chose electronic invoicing are 35% more likely to pay their bills on time. Those who used an automatic recurring bill were a whopping 86% more likely to pay those bills on time. That was no surprise to us. Study after study -- and the experiences of our clients, too -- show that quicker turnaround on payments is a primary benefit for e-invoicing.

Here was a result we did find surprising: electronic bill users buy 20% more products than those who stick with paper bills. It's possible that more affluent consumers are less resistant to e-invoicing, but the study didn't find any significant differences between the two groups apart from their billing choice.

Again, the overall sense of convenience may just give these consumers a happy feeling about companies that offer the electronic payment option.

Shouldn't your company be one of those companies?

Tonight we will be gathering together as Tweeps for a cause at the second annual FargoTwestival.

Thank You! to all of you who have made your donations and bought your tickets. We have not only reached our original $500 goal but we have surpassed our second goal in just one week. As of this writing, we're providing supplies for 26 children, and we're not through yet!

There's still time to buy a ticket for tonight's Twestival.  Your $7 donation will buy school supplies for a needy child for a quarter of the school year -- $28 buys school supplies for the whole year. Do the math and help as many kids as you can: every donation equals a ticket to the Twestival.

When we see you at Jitter’s you will see a physical representation of the help we are providing to those who truly need our help. Not to mention the chance to see the people you have been tweeting with, the volunteers, and the great selection from Jitters.

As an online community we have proven the power of our online connections and the powerful impact we have as a group. We can make the world a better place.

Tonight is the night and you can still purchase your ticket online or at the door! Beginning at only $4 you can help a child with the supplies they need to go to school. Look at what we can accomplish! I think we have destroyed the misconception that Twitter is a “time waster”.

See you at Jitters 1414 12th Ave N, Fargo 6:00pm to 8:00 pm Feel free to park in the NDSU “T” parking lot. They do not monitor after 4:30pm

In 1995, people talking about the future of money were predicting confidently that checks were on their way out, and that by now we'd all be using electronic billing systems exclusively.

We were also going to have flying cars, right? And live in space, wearing jumpsuits. 

It made sense, fifteen years ago, to assume that online invoicing would be the norm by now. Everyone agrees that it's cheaper and safer, and most people agree that it's  more convenient, too. It's certainly more environmentally responsible. In the 1990s, the numbers of people using such services were doubling annually, a trend which would have led to universal EIPP by now had it continued.

In the 21st century, adoption of EIPP continued, but a bit more slowly. In 2005,  69% of American households paid at least one monthly bill online. In 2007, online payments outstripped checks. People in the west and the south (where the most e-savvy consumers live, according to people who track these things) now make as much as 80% of their transactions online.

Nearly universal buy-in for EIPP is a reality now in Finland, we're told.

But for the United States as a whole, only 42% of transactions take place online.

Consumer demand is still the main reason businesses choose to offer electronic inovicing, and consumers are usually ahead of businesses on this, though more businesses choose to pay their own vendors electronically (when they're being consumers)than offer the service to their customers.

Consumers overwhelmingly prefer to pay their bills electronically, in spite of lingering concerns:

• 15% don't understand how it works, and therefore feel nervous about it.
• 51% choose to pay bills online for environmental reasons.
• 44% do it for the convenience. 

And yet the average wired American consumer pays bills in three different ways every month: 11 online, but the others with mailed checks or in person, usually because online payments aren't an option.

Why don't businesses offer e-invoicing, even when they choose to pay their own bills electronically?

Concern about costs and the effort of shifting over are the most commonly cited barriers.

It's probably the same with the flying cars. 

Call us at 701.356.9010 to discuss any concerns you may have about e-invoicing; we'll be able to reassure you. Flying cars? Maybe not. 

SmartPay is an intentionally green company. One of the reasons, in fact, to go with SmartPay electronic invoicing for your billing needs is that it cuts down on paper waste, fuel (no mail to be delivered), and toxins used in preparing ink, paper, and copy machine toner.

But sometimes people question this. "What about the electricity for running your computer?" they ask. "You can't think that e-invoicing is completely green if you use electricity for it."

We're glad to see people thinking about these things. We've thought about it, too. Here's our answer:

• The great majority of the fuel use for computers isn't the electricity used to run the computer, or even the electricity used to run the servers that stay on 24 hours a day, 7 days a week keeping things going. It's the electricity used for cooling the machines. Some studies estimate that two thirds of the electricity for computers is actually for cooling. Whatever we do to help slow down climate change -- including reducing our use of physical resources like paper and fossil fuels -- can help.
  
• Once your computer is on and running, it won't use any more fuel to run SmartPay than it would to run the spreadsheet, word processor, and printer you used to use to create those paper bills. In fact, turning off the printer can save as much energy as turning off your computer would.
• Energy-efficient computing is more about limiting the size of your monitor, giving up your screen saver and powering down when idle than about how much you actually use your keyboard. This is only relevant to billing if you actually wrote your invoices out by hand, though, since you probably used your computer to make paper bills.
  
• Having lots of software on your machine, on the other hand, can increase energy use, and can also slow down your computer. If you have lots of programs that you no longer run, or lots of unneeded files, consider taking an afternoon to clean up your computer. Give it a tune-up now and then, too, and you'll find that it runs better and you may get more done in less time -- thus reducing your energy usage.
• SmartPay is web-based, not software that runs on your computer, so it doesn't take up extra energy. The internet is an amazing energy-saver, and it runs much more efficiently now than it used to. Nearly anything you do on the web uses less electricity that the comparable task done without the internet.
• Having said that, we should also now suggest that the good-luck message email with music, a power point, and 17 large images that you were just about to forward to 200 of your closest friends should probably not be sent at all. If would take less energy than printing it all out or recording it and putting it into envelopes and sending it in the mail -- but you wouldn't do that, would you?

What's it like to use SmartPay?If you're not yet one of our happy customers, you might have wondered.

Jennifer Rise shared her experience at last week's seminar, and we're glad to share it with you here, too.

702 communications provides broadband and phone service here in Fargo and Moorhead. They provide data and network solutions for businesses, and digital TV as well as VoIP services for residential customers.

702 used to send out all their invoicing communications on paper. This meant that they prepared and mailed out paper bills, of course, but they also had to manually key in recurring bills each time and send them out, send out reminders, and even make reminder phone calls. 

Automating much of this has allowed the staff to turn their attention to more important and more satisfying tasks.

SmartPay provides the level of security 702 needs (very high) and also helps with customer integration. These factors give SmartPay additional value beyond the obvious one of getting the invoices out. 

Here are the results 702 has seen now that they use SmartPay:

•  Payments received have increased by 21% since they began using SmartPay in August of 2009.
• They're saving an average of $1.11 per statement.
• They have the complete security their industry demands.
• Their response rates are faster.
• They can upload payments and invoices daily, because the process is so fast and easy.

We asked Jennifer "Why SmartPay?"

"Very few systems out there have the type of billing we need," she explained. SmartPay is clean, simple, and modern. The customization gives 702 the look and feel that they want, and integration with the other systems they use was easy.

 We appreciate 702's willingness to share their experience with us, and with you. Now, you can contact SmartPay to find out just how it would work for you.