Payment Trends: The Rise of Voice Payments

The payments industry has seen a rapid transformation in the last several years – COVID-19 pushed more payments online and through same day ACH than ever before, and transaction and posting times have been drastically reduced to accommodate an ever-increasing speed at which people demand their payments.

The latest of the 2022 payment trends is voice payments and Nacha recently released a resource guide. Here’s what you need to know.

The Rise of Voice Payments

Voice-enabled devices and software have been gaining traction for several years, and it’s no surprise the next integration they’re tackling comes in the form of voice payments. Ease of access and technology-leveraging software drives the popularity of AI audio-enabled solutions.

Transactional banking and payment services are investing their time and energy into the latest tech trends, and digital assistants you can talk to have created a great opportunity for institutions looking to expand their financial services.

Conversational transactions – through chatbots, mobile assistants, AI-guided phone calls, etc. – continue to be in consumer demand. People are looking for seamless integration and fast service. And if you can tell an AI voice technology what you need and have them do it for you, there’s hardly anything that can be faster or more seamless.

The other draw to voice payments is personalization. Voice-based assistants are preferred in many homes over apps and other, less personal experiences. In fact, several financial services and institutions have even integrated with Siri already to allow for voice payments, including Bank of America, Ally Bank, and Venmo.

The Security of Voice Payments

But like with any emerging technology, one of the top concerns that voice payments conjure is the issue of security.

For the voice payment methods that currently exist, a mix of biometric and PIN authentication is being used. Though these steps slow down the payment process, they do a good job of creating a more secure interface with voice payment methods. The future of voice payments could very feasibly see better enhancements for voice biometrics, voice-data encryption, and other technologies.

Conversational AI has been a big focus for many developers over the years – and the popularity of voice-activated assistants doesn’t look like it will wane any time soon.

Advantages of Voice Payments

People can speak five times faster than they can type, generally. And voice payments could use that efficiency to create faster payment solutions – and technology speed is a huge motivator for financial services businesses as well as a large benefit for consumers.

Speech technology can also assist speakers of multiple languages, and others with unique needs, to help them with online search items and digital transaction completion.

These new voice payments and technologies will also allow for a better customer experience. You can continue the post-COVID contactless and hands-free preferences and create a personalized and enhanced experience for many users, even those with special needs or requests.

This technology will also be able to help customers search and inquire about certain functions or services a business or financial services provider may have to offer.

Voice Payment Disadvantages

There are also some areas of concern when it comes to integrating payments with voice software.

Some people believe that voice assistants are “always listening” and that this creates a backlog of information that can be stolen and/or used to negatively impact the lives of its users. This mistrust will be an especially prudent hurdle to overcome as these payment options grow in availability.

There is also the question of how different accents and dialects of specific languages will be handled. We’ve all seen videos of people asking Alexa or Siri for something, only to get an inappropriate or humorous translation of the request that has nothing to do with the original inquiries.

But with time and voice-recognition software that continues to learn and adapt to users, voice payments will create new opportunities for businesses around the world.

Payment Integration Creates Momentum for Your Business

Voice payments may not be on the roster yet for ReliaFund, but this new technology does remind us how important it is to have seamless software integrations when it comes to payment processing. Your customers want options when they check out or need to pay a bill to you.

ReliaFund’s no-sweat integrations make payment processing simple across a wide range of industries. Our software allows you to integrate a payment gateway API into your website and accept any type of payment online – credit, debit, e-check, ACH transfer, and more.