Digital Payments are Table Stakes: Here’s What Agencies Need to Succeed

Hello everyone. Thank you so much for joining us today. Before we begin, just a couple quick notes. All attendees are muted, but please submit questions in the question box at any time. We’ll answer as many as we can at the end of our session today. And if you would like to revisit anything that we’ve covered, we will send the recording and slides to everyone after the webinar. Let’s go ahead and get started.

Great. Thank you, everybody. We’re excited to talk with you today. So, I really would like to start with a quick story. A few months ago, I was speaking with an elected official who said something that really resonated with me. She said, “You know, we’ve had online payments for years and technically everything works, but my team is still reconciling across three different systems. Residents still called to ask if their payment went through, and every department just feels like it’s operating in its own digital silo.” And as I was hearing her say this, I was thinking to myself, she is not alone.

Well, that resonates, Ellyn. I am hearing the same conclusion from many of my prospects that I work with in different conversations. I’m Emily Rodriguez, the solution consulting director at PayIt.

And I am Ellyn Latimer, a regional managing director at PayIt. And we are here to talk to you today about the importance of making it easy for residents to interact with government agencies and how these agencies can simplify operations, reduce workload, and collect revenue faster.

And we’re going to unpack why that happens and what changes when those pieces are intentionally designed to work together. Most states and local agencies already offer online payments via a payment page where a resident can pay online. And I think for the most part, those transactions process successfully. But what is important to really recognize here is that there is so much more to a digital strategy than just the payment. Interacting with a government agency should be easy and intuitive for a resident, and it should streamline and reduce manual efforts in the back office process for the agency. So for our listeners out there, we ask you to consider this. If you had to rate your agency and how it is providing a digital experience for your residents on a scale of 1 to 10, where would you land? And really be honest.

So, Emily, I would like to start with the resident experience because really this is where everything shows up. What should be a simple task to go online and make a payment often feels very different to the person actually trying to do it. Residents are searching for the right page. They’re not quite sure where to go. They click into one system and then they’re getting redirected to another. And before long, what should take only a few minutes starts to feel very fragmented and uncertain, but they go ahead and they submit the payment and then they pause and say, “Did that actually go through?” And then when there’s any doubt, they’re going to call your office, not necessarily because something is broken, but because the experience didn’t give them the confidence they were looking for.

And I think when you really zoom out, this just isn’t a one-off moment. It’s how the experience is truly structured and many different jurisdictions, and in many cases residents are going to completely different websites depending on what they need. So utilities might live in one place, property taxes somewhere else, courts is in an entirely different system, and every time that resident is having to start over: different portals, different processes, different payment flows. They have to figure out what’s due, search for the right payable, pull out their card, re-enter their information over and over. And from a resident’s perspective, none of that makes sense. They don’t think in terms of departments or systems. They expect their government to know who they are. They don’t really care what’s happening behind the scenes. They just want it to be simple for them. So when you think about that experience and you think back to the 1 to 10 scale, the gap that usually starts to show up is right in that experience in the beginning.

So true, Emily. I mean, I feel that myself when I have gone online to make payments, it’s a little daunting. But also, when you look at this bigger issue. It’s not the issue that residents really can’t pay. It’s that the experience was never designed for them in the first place. It was designed around the systems in place for those departments and their processes, not around the person who’s actually interacting with the government. 

And then to take it a step further, if you think about the staff side and the team members on the back end, they’re exporting reports from multiple systems. The reconciliation is getting deposited manually. They’re logging into separate dashboards to track those different disputes, handling login-related support tickets because there’s multiple systems that the residents are having to gain access to. And then you think about posting payments one by one from those multiple different sites, and not to mention a very manual refund process. Technically, the systems all work. They just don’t work together. And as your digital volume grows, your operational strain grows with it. And this truly becomes the turning point. Government leaders start to ask, well, we thought this digitizing would simplify things. Why does this feel harder?

I think I know: because it wasn’t a digital strategy. It was just layered things, one vendor after the next. So, what I really mean by that is most of you have your mission-critical system, which we’ll call your system of record. They have a payment page that’s supporting their solution, but then there’s other payments that your agency needs to take as well. So you add on a payment processor, a merchant processor, and there’s really no consistency across any of your departments in your agency, and it’s not making it simple for the residents. And most of the time, like we talked about, the issue isn’t processing the payment. It’s the lack of the user intuitiveness, the lack of the integrations and the workflows, and being able to automate your manual processes.

And the whole other important distinction to truly call out is processing payments and partnering with an end-to-end solution provider are two totally different approaches. Right? So to kind of recap, what we are really seeing is agencies using a method similar to a merchant processor who handles the card and ACH transactions. They’re routing the funds and they’re authorizing the payments and they’re settling them into the government bank accounts, but the rest of that work, which is a lot, is falling to the agency. So by moving forward to a unified, resident-centered payment experience, agencies can really meet the rising expectations of citizens, of their support staff, and really truly modernize government services, resulting in collecting revenue faster.

And so what those traditional payment processors don’t do: they’re not providing this unified front-end resident experience. They’re not having workflow continuity across different services or departments for the resident. It’s not an integrated identity. They’re not taking care of the PCI compliance burden or providing real-time back office visibility and reporting.
Yeah. So the PayIt platform supports the full end-user experience as well as a robust administrative experience with insights and data and access to real-time payments across all the different departmental needs, and PayIt is really committing to supporting the long-term digital transformation, including this end-to-end platform with a unified single resident profile, guided workflows, integrated payments, and we also support those non-monetary transactions. So, like we talked about, the centralized reporting across all departments. And I think it’s also really important to note that PayIt only works with government agencies. So, we really understand the pain and the fragmentation that you may feel you’re experiencing.
Yeah, that’s truly all that we do within the government agencies. And so when we think about unifying the residents’ identity, the workflows, the payments, residents now are going to log in once. They’re provided with this modern user experience. They see all of their obligations in one place. They have stored payment methods that are securely saved and used across those different departments, those different services that they need to take care of business on. And then operationally on the back end, you’re going to see those support calls decrease. Reconciliation is going to simplify. Reporting becomes centralized, and it comes it moves from accepting transactions to delivering digital services and an actual experience.

Yeah, all this is great, Emily. I think this would be a really great time to maybe take a look at what we’re talking about.
Absolutely. Let’s go ahead and jump into a quick demonstration. So when we think about what we’re looking today, imagine this as a art of what is possible for your residents and the experience that they could have. So they’re brought into this landing page. It’s one secure place that they are going across all of the different departments. It’s one profile that they are logging into to be able to see everything that they can take care of within the agency. And when that user logs into the platform, they’re now going to be brought directly into this service details page, where it really paints a picture of who that resident is and what they need to take care of in the agency. 

So, it’s going to show you things that the resident needs to focus their attention on, like paying their property taxes, or maybe they have some type of citation or case they need to pay, or maybe they’re just coming in to check what their water bill amount is. All of that is front and center and recognizes who that resident is. So, it gives them a sense of security. I’m in the right place. This is my agency. As they scroll down, you’re able to see all of those different services that you make available to those residents. So, things like property tax, court fines and fees, water, or even something that isn’t integrated. I just need to come in and pay a miscellaneous payable. All of that is front and center, easy, intuitive for that resident to take care of business. 

If they drill in to explore those different services, here’s where you’re able to see the actions that they are able to take. So something like moving forward and actually connecting an account or a property so that it remembers the resident next time that they log in. This is where they’re able to do so. We want to make this as easy and intuitive as we can for the resident. So enabling lots of different ways to find their account, whether it’s through bill number, their name, their address. All of these are different configuration settings. As you go through implementation with your PayIt partner, we will make sure that we make this as easy as we can for your residents to be able to search for their account and actually make that connection. 

Once that connection gets made, now the resident is able to see all of the available bills that they have associated with this specific type of property, which then they could drill into to view the different details pulling forward from that system of record, and then ultimately adding that directly into their cart to make their payment. And once it populates into the cart, they’ll be then taken through this checkout experience where it remembers who that resident is based on their profile. It remembers their digital wallet, all of their different payment methods, for them to actually move forward and make their payment.

 But we do a lot more than just provide a way to take payments. We can also digitize different forms for submission. So here’s a couple examples, but think about there’s some type of form. Maybe you want the resident to upload an application or the actual PDF document. Or maybe you want to truly digitize the whole thing. We can prepopulate some of those fields for you. We can capture additional information. We can even capture document uploads as well as a time, date, and stamp of that electronic signature that then gets submitted off into our administrator tool called ProSite. 

And so lastly, from the resident’s perspective, we saw that cart where all of those different payment methods were stored. You also have access into all of those different payment methods to make your adjustments, add additional cards on file or bank accounts on file, and view all of that payment history right in your pocket. And when we think about the back office system and visibility into everything that that resident has done, here’s our tool called ProSite, where you’re able to see insight about all of those different forms or applications that have been submitted, the status and the steps that you need to take it through the different workflow, as well as all of those different payment methods that are visible to the resident as well. 

And then very lastly, just thinking about this from a big picture perspective, everything is now funneling into one space. So in terms of your reconciliation and your revenue that’s now collected, you have a clear picture of all of the different services, which you can filter on to slice and dice the information that you need. But ultimately, this is giving you insight that you can then turn into action.

So let’s pause for a quick reset. So far, we’ve covered three things. User experience matters. Unifying the department creates a seamless experience. And payments alone don’t equal strategy. Emily, you want to add anything else?

No.

Okay, great. So, to our audience again, if you’re stepping back and really evaluating your digital strategy, there are a few things that matter most. First, does the experience feel unified for your residents? Can they log in one time the way Emily just showed us and see everything in one place and move through the services without any friction? And are you providing those flexible payment options and offering all of the different payment channels for your residents? Really meeting them where they are. Second, are payments truly integrated across your systems, or are they still sitting off to the side? And then on the operational side, who owns the PCI compliance? Who owns the security? Who’s doing your fraud detection? Is your scope getting simpler? And how many systems is your finance team actually touching every day to do their reconciliation? So ultimately, it comes down to this: are you working with a vendor that processes transactions, or are you partnering with one that’s helping you build a digital engagement platform that actually scales and allows you to better serve your citizens?

I think that is such a great point, Ellyn. When you think about a partner, one of PayIt’s core philosophies is that we aren’t just a vendor. We are your team for the long haul. So thinking over on the left side, it starts with implementation. Our team works directly with your staff to integrate our platform into your existing systems. The goal here is speed and compliance, getting a high-quality resident experience live as quickly as possible. And then of course, once you’re live, the client operations team takes the baton. They’re sort of our engine room, monitoring your different services, managing your technical updates, ensuring that everything remains seamless as your needs continue to evolve. And truly at the center of it all is client success. This is your dedicated partner who deeply understands your specific goals. They aren’t just looking at the technical side. They’re looking at the big picture strategy to ensure that you’re hitting those KPIs year-over-year. And of course, our platform is only successful if people use it. And that’s where our resident communication comes in. We will collaborate with your teams to run marketing programs backed by brand strategy to help drive that digital adoption among your residents. And then for those residents who maybe need a little bit of extra help or handholding, we will and can provide optional resident support, where we offer self-service help centers and a flexible support model so that your staff doesn’t have to feel every basic troubleshooting question.

Yeah. And I’d like to add this to the PayIt team continually shows up for its clients, which actually adds more value to them, and they continue to add additional services because of that whole unified experience that we’re talking about. So I’d like to close with this. Digital payments are just one piece of the puzzle. What really moves the needle is how everything connects, as we’ve been talking about: the single resident profile, the structured workflows that are mapping to your business rules, and of course the payments and the importance of reporting. And while this can really feel like a big shift, it’s not something that agencies are going to take on alone. As Emily shared, we’re really here to work alongside you and to design the right experience and integrate with your systems and bring that structured approach that’s been proven across so many different agencies. So, the real question here today is, are you going to just continue to manage transactions, or should you start to build a digital strategy that will better serve your citizens? If that’s a conversation you’re having or thinking about, we’d love to continue it with you.

And before we wrap today, Ellyn, as we’ve gone through the webinar, there have been a couple questions that have popped into the Q&A. So, if you want to go ahead and pull those up.

Sure, we can. The first question we received is if you are looking to adopt a digital strategy for a payment plate sorry payment platform how does PayIt differ from others?

I think to this one I would say, based on our experience and conversations that we’ve had with clients, a lot of back office systems, like the CMS system, the property tax or utility solution, charge heavy fees for integrations to third-party systems or sometimes even say that they won’t integrate. Luckily with PayIt, we have a team that’s dedicated just to integrations, because that truly is part of the core of how we provide a great resident experience. We have integrated with a lot of the major vendors in the public sector. We’re really comfortable with APIs. We’re comfortable with flat files, even a hybrid approach, a combination of the two. It truly just depends on your system of record and what is available for us to connect with.

Great. Let me go ahead and look at the next question here. What are the common signs that an agency may have an online payments adoption challenge?

Great question. So, I think you should look at things such as if you’re seeing large volumes of mailed-in payments or you have a high call volume of payment help. If there’s long lines in your office and your staff is stressed out due to those abundance of people in the office, these are usually the signs that the adoption hasn’t reached the level that you could be at. And the reason for this is most likely tied to the ability to make those transactions across different departments, or you’re confusing your residents with the user experience. And then also, of course, those limited payment options, and residents simply just may not know that those options are even available to them.

I’ll, you know, add: agencies that see the highest adoption usually focus on making the digital experience consistent and easy for residents to return to.

Thank you, Ellyn. I think that is all the time that we have for the questions today. Thank you to everyone who submitted questions. If we did not get to yours today, we will be following up with you via email. Before you leave, I just wanted to invite you to check out the PayIt GovLab. PayIt GovLab is a series of short educational sessions focused on topics like AI in the government, increasing resident adoption of digital services, and improving revenue collection. So, if you’re interested in continuing the conversation, you can just scan that QR code on your screen to explore additional sessions and recordings that we have. Thank you again for joining us today, and we hope to see you in the future. Thank you.