This is the first article in a two-part series on payments metrics for corporate treasury

Payments sit at the centre of today’s digital, data-driven economy, enabling corporates to move funds securely and efficiently across borders, currencies and counterparties.

The global payments landscape is evolving rapidly. Real-time payments are expanding, cross-border payment volumes are growing, and new rails and payment methods are proliferating. At the same time, payments fraud remains persistent and increasingly sophisticated. Looking ahead to 2026, developments such as broader ISO 20022 adoption, richer transaction data, and the potential integration of stablecoins into treasury and finance workflows add further complexity. In this environment, corporate treasurers must look beyond innovation headlines and focus on the metrics that genuinely improve payments efficiency and resilience.

The following sections—drawn from the Association for Financial Professionals® (AFP) Executive Guide: Selecting the Right Treasury Metrics—outlines six key metrics that enable corporate treasury and finance leaders to bolster payments efficiency. Each metric can help treasury strengthen payments operations amid macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainty.

1. Cost per Payment

Cost per payment measures the total cost required to execute a single payment, including bank fees, processing charges, platform costs, staff time, and exception handling. This metric is often segmented by rail (ACH, real-time, wires, cards) and region to identify structural inefficiencies.​

In uncertain times, this measurement helps treasurers rebalance volumes toward lower-cost payment methods without compromising speed or control—for example, shifting routine domestic vendor payments from wires to ACH or instant payments where available. Besides rationalising payment methods, monitoring cost per payment also enables treasury teams to negotiate more effectively with banks and steer volumes toward more efficient payment rails—particularly for high-frequency domestic and cross-border transactions.

2. Number of Payments per FTE

Number of payments per full-time equivalent (FTE) captures how many payments are processed per treasury or payments staff member over a defined period. Low payments-per-FTE ratios often signal manual processes or fragmented systems, or duplicate effort.

By contrast, a high payments-per-FTE ratio indicates that the treasury department has successfully leveraged automation and standardised systems to process a large volume of transactions without increasing headcount or operational risk—an increasingly important capability in constrained operating environments.

3. Percentage of ACH payments versus wires and cheques (checks)

This metric tracks the proportion of payments executed via ACH relative to more expensive instruments such as wires and legacy paper cheques (checks). Heavy reliance on manual or high-cost payment methods increases processing costs, operational friction, and exposure to fraud.

A sound payments strategy gradually shifts routine, low-value transactions toward ACH, reserving wires for truly urgent or high-value payments, while reducing or eliminating cheques wherever possible.

4. Percentage of automated payments

The percentage of automated payments measures the share of total payment volume that is initiated and processed without manual intervention. In quantifies the proportion of payments that flows through fully automated, rules-based processes—often via a TMS, ERP or payment hub—without manual keying or rework.  

Manual payment initiation introduces errors, delays, and heightened fraud risk. Automation mitigates operational risk, while improving consistency, control, and auditability. In uncertain times, greater automation also provides the data richness needed for timely cash forecasting and scenario analysis and helps ensure payments continue to flow smoothly even when operating conditions change rapidly or staffing is constrained.

5. Percentage of payments going through the treasury management system (TMS)

This metric evaluates the proportion of payments initiated, approved, and transmitted through the TMS rather than directly through bank portals.

Centralizing payments through the TMS improves visibility across banks, currencies and entities, while strengthening reporting quality, governance, cash positioning, controls, and fraud detection.

6. Percentage of payment exceptions

Payment exceptions reflect the percentage of payments that fail, require manual intervention, or trigger investigation. Exceptions commonly stem from data-quality issues, incomplete or invalid beneficiary information, insufficient funding, missed cut-offs, failed validations, or bank-rejected transactions.​

Tracking this metric helps treasury teams identify systemic issues such as poor master data, format mismatches or inadequate validations, improve bank connectivity, and prioritize fixes that enhance cash visibility and payment reliability.

To sum up, no single metric can capture the full picture of payments efficiency; the power lies in viewing these indicators as an integrated dashboard that connects cost, throughput, channel strategy, automation, platform usage, and operational quality.

As the payments ecosystem continues to evolve—through real-time rails, augmented data standards, and emerging instruments—treasury teams that consistently measure and manage these efficiency metrics will be better positioned to navigate uncertainty with greater control, agility, and resilience. By doing so, they can support the broader enterprise with confidence and ensure that every outbound payment supports both operational continuity and strategic value creation.