Finding time in foreign exchange – How can you save time and money on mass international payments?

If one or more employees in your business had just one extra working day every month, how much more could they get done and more importantly what could it do for your business? 

Having a mass international payments solution for your business can help you gain back the time your employees currently spend checking and chasing international payments. Whether it be ordering raw materials, paying suppliers or selling products abroad many businesses are influenced by the FX market as part of their day to day operations, sometimes without even realising. 

Finance teams will know that inputting data for each payment into a spreadsheet can be very time consuming and opens up the chance for unforced errors. They will also be aware of the potential complications around paying and receiving funds in multiple currencies as well as the financial costs involved as well. By using an API to plug a mass payments system into your current setup your business can save both time and money every month. 

Do I need a system to manage my payments? 

The first reason you will want to add a mass international payments solution to your business is due to the time saving impact it will have on your finance team. Imagine a UK business buys products from Europe to sell to the US. The business therefore purchases stock in Euros, receives orders from the US and is paid in USD, the dollars are then exchanged into pounds. This is simple enough to manage if it is only a handful full of payments per month but as the business grows and that becomes hundreds or thousands or individual payments per month, the best and really the only way to manage these is through automation.

Not only is automation a far quicker way to deal with a high volume of individual transactions but it also minimises the likelihood of mistakes occurring. Quite quickly implementing an automated system becomes a no brainer for business dealing in different international markets.  

 

Concerns from within

It is evident then that utilising an automated system for your mass international payments is hugely beneficial from both a time and cost saving perspective and therefore everyone within the business will want to implement it immediately, potentially not. Unfortunately there may be some concerns and ultimately reluctancy from staff within the business who view an automated system as a threat to their jobs. 

The Finance Manager of one business that we provide with a mass international payments solution was initially reluctant to switch to our fully automated system. This was due to the fact that a lot of the finance team’s time was taken up by the complications of the business’ international payments and that an automated system would leave their jobs vulnerable. This was not the case however and now the finance team and indeed the whole company are reaping the benefits of having extra working days per month for the staff to focus on improving and growing other elements of the business.

There is a common misconception that an automated system will reduce the workload and therefore replace staff within the finance team, but this certainly doesn’t have to be the case. A mass international payments system is there to make the entirety of the businesses international payments more efficient allowing staff to focus on improving customer service or pushing the business forward in other ways. 

 

A real life example 

Our team of foreign exchange experts have helped businesses in the past transform the way they process their mass international payments and continue to support some of these businesses on a monthly basis. For example, a translation business working with multiple translators in different currencies was spending more than four days per month across two members of staff processing their international payments. By using Currency UK’s mass international payments service all of the business’ overseas payments could be automated resulting in the business freeing up four days per month for the staff to focus on other ways of improving customer service. Overall, the switch to the automated system has saved the business time, money and has reduced the risk of errors when dealing with payments. 

The most effective way to manage your business’ international payments is to use an FX specialist such as Currency//UK. Our mass international payments system can easily plug into the current system you have in place and work immediately to save your both time and money. 

Our job as FX brokers is straightforward, we mitigate currency risk for your business and make the whole process of foreign exchange as simple as possible.

If you would like to find out more about how we can support your business with its foreign exchange requirements call us today on +44 (0 )20 7738 0777 or click here to open a business account with us.