The 2022 AFP Digital Payments Survey, underwritten by J.P. Morgan, provides insights into how organizations are rapidly adopting digital payments solutions in response to recent significant global challenges. This year’s survey results suggest companies in the U.S. are actively shifting their payment methods away from checks to digital alternatives. The use of checks by organizations’ customers is decreasing at a rapid pace, also declining is check payments to suppliers. These trends are expected to continue.

Highlights include:

• Thirty-three percent of B2B payments in the U.S. and Canada continue to be made by check, a nine-point decline since 2019. Globally, payments made by check account for only 31 percent of B2B payments.
• Thirty percent of organizations in the U.S. and Canada receive payments from their customers by checks. This is a 6-percentage point drop from the 36 percent reported in 2019. 

• Within North America, when paying major suppliers, the gap between paper and digital payments has widened to 13 percentage points, with 39 percent of organizations using ACH credits while 26 percent continue to use checks.
• A majority of respondents (54 percent) cite the speed of payment is a significant driver in the adoption of digital payment methods, especially with the current market disruptions of inflation and weakened supply chains.   
• Accordingly, 62 percent of all respondents indicate that faster payments have very positively or positively impacted their organizations. 

• Digital payments come with some challenges; in the current market, 34 percent cite a shortage of IT resources for implementation as a major barrier, while 30 percent consider convincing customers to pay digitally a major barrier. 

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Press Release

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If you are interested in referencing data from this report in marketing materials, etc. please contact Anissa Holm, Research Manager. 

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Questions about this subject?
Contact Tom Hunt, Director of Treasury Services at AFP.