Switched to batch ACH processing after 8 years of doing it one by one

I used to process every single payroll payment individually in our system because I thought it was safer. Then our account rep at Chase showed me their batch tool handles up to 500 payments in one file with built in duplicate checks. Cut my Friday processing time from 2 hours down to about 15 minutes. Has anyone else found a painless way to automate their recurring vendor payments?

3 comments

3 Comments

clairem471mo agoMost Upvoted

Oh wow, that is a huge time saver! I do the same thing with my vendor payments now. I set up recurring batches with our bank and it flags any duplicates automatically. It took me a while to trust it, but after testing it with small amounts first, I saw how accurate the system really is. The best part is I can schedule the batch to run at night after I go home. So I just upload the file in the morning, check it once more, and then it processes overnight. No more staying late on Fridays just to click through each payment one at a time.

cameron5381mo ago

Yeah I totally get the hesitancy at first, it's hard to trust a machine with money stuff. I finally broke down and tried it with like $50 payments just to see, and after a week of zero errors I started using it for everything. The night scheduling is a game changer for real, I do the same thing now where I set it all up before I leave and then check the report in the morning. It basically cut my friday workload in half because I'm not babysitting every single payment going out. I also set up alerts on my phone so if anything gets flagged as a duplicate I get a text right away, lets me fix problems before they even hit the bank. Feels good to finally have a system that works instead of fighting with spreadsheets all week.

gray61mo ago

I get why people like it, but I see it a little different. That part where you said "check it once more in the morning" is exactly my problem. You're still doing a manual check, so you're not really saving that much time, you're just moving it around. And if something glitches overnight, you might not catch it until after the batch already went through. I tried the whole auto-batch thing for a few months and it worked fine until it didn't. I had one duplicate slip through because the flag system missed it and then I had to spend days fixing it with the bank. For me, I'd rather just stay the extra hour on Friday and watch it go out, knowing for sure everything is correct. It's like the old saying goes, you can automate your way into a bigger mess if you're not careful.