Positive Pay
Be proactive about fraud.
Positive Pay helps your business monitor check and ACH payments and act quickly to stop unauthorized check and ACH transactions.
Positive Pay is an important tool for business owners to reduce the risk of fraudulent activity to your account(s). Think of it as a security system for your business checking account that complements your internal security measures. With Positive Pay, you can reject unauthorized payments before incurring a loss. Alerts keep you informed about exceptions, decisions, and approvals so you constantly know the status of your ACH and check payments.
Whether your business writes checks, or uses ACH Manager to send electronic payments, our Positive Pay solution gives your business the peace of mind it needs.
ACH Positive Pay
ACH Positive Pay helps guard against unauthorized electronic transactions. You define the ACH authorization rules for your account(s) that determine what types of ACH transactions will be allowed to process or post to your account. If an ACH transaction is presented that doesn’t meet the rules you established, you will get an alert prompting you to review the exception item(s) and make a decision to “pay” or “return” each item.
- Manage and monitor ACH debit based on rules you establish
- Establish an approved list of vendors
- Set monitoring criteria (i.e. maximum dollar limits, frequency, start/end dates)
- Establish a list of blocked vendors
- Prevent unauthorized ACH transactions from posting to your account
- Preauthorize ACH payments
Check Positive Pay
Check Positive Pay matches the checks you issue against those presented for payment. Once enrolled, the default settings within Check Positive Pay utilize Reverse Positive Pay. Customers will receive daily notifications about ALL checks presented for payment and must review these checks to make a decision to “pay” or “return” each item. Only those checks that are approved for payment by the customer will be paid. If no decision is made by the daily cut-off time (11:00 AM EDT/EST, Monday – Friday excluding holidays), the item(s) will be automatically returned.
Alternatively, customers can upload a check issue file or manually enter individual check file information (check/serial number, dollar amount, payee name, and check status) into Check Positive Pay. As checks are presented for payment, Check Positive Pay compares each check against the information on file. If any of the details do not match, you will receive an alert prompting you to review the exception item(s) and make a decision to “pay” or “return” each item.
- Compare checks presented for payment against your authorized check issue information
- Detect fraudulent checks
- Streamline check reconcilement
- Ensure payee names are not altered
- Protect against stale-dated checks
Positive Pay Benefits
Stop Unauthorized Transactions
- Respond quickly to stop unauthorized transactions from clearing your account
- Review suspicious items
- Protect against payee alteration
- Protect against unissued items
- Protect against payment on voided checks
- Protect against duplicate payments
- Reduce disbursement risk
- Monitor stale dated checks
Customize Permissions and Access
- Layered user permissions
- Multi-user access with specific levels of authority
- Limit user account access
- Retain ownership of users and permissions within your company
- Dual decisioning allows businesses to designate dual approval parameters
- Manage notification rules
Save Time and Money
- Minimize potential losses
- Reduce the administrative time and expense of investigating fraud
- Limit potential legal fees
- Return unauthorized items quickly
- Automate check reconciliation
- Simplify your accounts payable process
- Improve audit control
- Utilize robust reporting tools
Watch our Positive Pay Tutorial
Ready to enroll? Let us help you put this valuable solution to work.
Contact Cash Management Services or one of our branch managers today and connect with our experienced business banking specialists and begin the enrollment process.
Ed Abedi
Vice President
Cash Management
410-689-7581
Email Cash Management Services
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)