Camping In Ontario Update Newsletter June 2019 September 2013 | Page 20

CAMPING IN ONTARIO UPDATE | 20 Independent Info on Corporate Creditor Bill Payment Service I started by researching information on the banks that I wanted my customers to be able to pay through. I chose RBC, TD Canada Trust, CIBC, PC Financial, Scotiabank, and BMO. In my research I discovered there are two ways to set up the online banking. 1. Non-consolidated: Each bank sends you information when payments are made. 2. Consolidated: Set your bank up as a lead bank. The other banks will send the lead bank information when payments are made. The lead bank will consolidate that information and forward it to your company. The non-consolidated method was better for our company since we will be manually entering the payments into our reservation system and there will be low to moderate volume of payments. The implementation cost was significantly higher for the consolidated method and there would still be monthly fees from the other banks. The additional costs did not outweigh the benefit of using the consolidated method over the non-consolidated method. Most banks have fees associated with this service; BMO does not currently have fees. These include one-time setup fees, fixed monthly fees, and variable monthly fees. These fees are accurate as of February 2013 for the non-consolidated method of online banking. Please note that PC Financial is affiliated with CIBC and I am unsure whether both banks have fees or there is one set of fees for both banks. RBC Implementation Fee Fixed Monthly Fee RBC Client Non-RBC Client Reports (per report) Email or Fax Bill Payment Delivered (per payment) 1 to 100 101 to 1000 1001 and over TD Canada Trust $125 $15 $25 $1.25 Implementation Fee $125 Fixed Monthly Fee TD Client $15 Non-TD Client $25 Report Fee 0 to 20 payments $0 21 to 200 payments $10 201 + per 100 payments $10 $0.065 $0.060 $0.055 Accepting payment via credit card costs approximately 2% of the sale amount. This means that for a payment of $3000, such as camping fees, the credit card fee would be $60. Using online bill payments costs significantly less per transaction however there are fixed monthly fees to consider. Taking into account the fixed monthly fees and the variable costs for the above six banks, the breakeven point would be at approximately $61,000 in sales. Any funds paid online above the $61,000 total will result in a cost savings over credit cards. The setup process for online billing starts with the bank that you as a company deal with. You are required to fill out some paper work and they will forward notification that you want this service to the other banks that you selected. From there, each bank will contact you and will request that you fill out paperwork with them. Some banks will notify you in their original paperwork, while others will notify you in follow-up papers when the setup date is. In general, the entire process took about two months for most of the banks; BMO is an exception and will be up to four months. The banks seem to batch new online billers so there are only certain activation dates. All the dates for the banks will be different so there could be a long period of time between when you send the paperwork in and when the service is actually up and running. Once the service is operating, bill remittance information will be faxed or emailed to you. The reports specify the account number, name of the customer, and the amount they paid. Generally reports are not generated if there are no payments however you can request zero remittance reports be sent. Each report sent will have an audit or sequence number on it. This is to help keep accurate records of payments; if a number is missing from the sequence then a report has gone missing. Contact Information RBC CIBC and PC Financial Irene Dolbik Phone: [phone] [email protected] Sarvat Ara Phone: [phone] Option 1 ext 4609 [email protected] TD Canada Trust Scotiabank CIBC and PC Financial Implementation Fee $125 Fixed Monthly Fee $5 Report Fee Scotia Client $1.50 Non-Scotia Client $2.50 CSV Reports Scotia Client $15 Non-Scotia Client $20 Implementation Fee Fixed Monthly Fee CIBC Client Non-CIBC Client Fee per payment Fax Reporting Fee $125 $15 $25 $.055 $1.25 Linda Neely Phone: [phone] Scotiabank BMO Robert Remmerswaal Phone: [phone] [email protected] Elaine Leonard Phone: [phone] [email protected] Submitted by Highland Pines. This article is independent research and other campgrounds have found it valuable which is why we are sharing it with you. Please do your own due diligence.   ■