Metro Bank has become a direct participant of Bacs, the Pay.UK-operated payment system, helping enable Direct Debit origination for business customers through a new partnership with Bottomline Technologies. Through this partnership, Metro Bank has deployed technology to take greater control of its payments capabilities and bring a best-in-class solution to market.

Metro Bank business customers will be able to create, automatically collect and manage payments via Direct Debit - a service that is sometimes not accessible to many smaller SMEs. The bank says that Direct Debit is the safest and most cost effective method of getting paid or for regular or occasional payment commitments.

According to the UK Finance Payments in the UK report from July 2019, 76% of regular payments are made by Direct Debit. More than 15% of small and 30% of medium-sized businesses accept Direct Debit as a payment method, reported the UK Finance Business Payments Survey from March 2019.

In 2019, Metro Bank also announced partnerships with Personetics, RMS Group Services, Funding Options, Conance, and DueDil and as part of the bank’s commitment to collaborating with UK SMEs and fintechs by embedding them into the products and services it provides.

“We’re seeing real transformation in the payments industry and this needs to benefit smaller SMEs too,” said Paul Riseborough, chief commercial officer at Metro Bank. “By becoming a direct participant of Bacs and partnering with Bottomline Technologies, we will offer a best-in-class solution for our SME customers to collect payments via Direct Debit. By removing the complexity of regular payments we can save customers vital time, that can better be spent running and growing their businesses.”

“We are excited to be working in partnership with Metro Bank to enable wider access to payment systems and bring Direct Debit capabilities to SMEs through our technology platform,” added Nigel Savory, managing director, Europe at Bottomline Technologies. “SMEs have traditionally found it challenging to get access to Direct Debit with all the benefits it brings - but Metro Bank business customers will soon have access in a simple and secure way.”