At Insights London, our annual client conference for EMEA, over 200 corporate customers and representatives from all major global banks attended a panel discussion on ‘Innovations in Corporate Liquidity Management and the Effects on Banks’. Fundtech panellist Ifor Williams, outlined the growth of e-invoicing in Europe and how potential barriers to adoption, such as compliance and standards are quickly being combated to help banks to offer e-invoicing services to their corporate customers.

When asked the question ‘If you could easily send an e-invoice as a request for payment to any of your customers through your bank network, would you be more likely to use e-invoicing?” 85% of corporates said they would be more likely to adopt E-invoicing if their banks supported it.

A very interesting result indeed. Banks are actually very good at providing reliable, scalable, efficient global transactional services so why limit these services to payment transactions when corporates expect more?. Despite the turmoil within the industry, corporates are still more likely to entrust core services like e-Invoicing to recognised bank brands than unrecognised third party suppliers. Providing E-Invoicing capitalises brand recognition and the increased utility of bank services further cements customer loyalty.

The message for banks that they should be supporting their corporate client’s electronic invoicing requirements, especially SMEs seems to be getting through. When asked “Do you provide, or plan to provide e-invoicing services to you corporate customers,” 40% of banks in the audience said that they are planning to offer these services.