effect of the Internet on payment processing, The

Work Process Improvement Today, Dec 1998 by Lamm, David R

If your payment center is run by a bank, the value of offering electronic bill delivery and payment services is even more strategic. If you are not prepared for electronic payments, your revenue will be irretrievably reduced as electronic payments become more prevalent. Only by controlling and offering electronic billing and payment services can the payment center continue to keep its clients and its business.

The returns are significant. By controlling this service, the bank builds its commercial relationships, controls the fee structure, controls the ACH origination for its clients and enhances its retail relationships. "My belief is that banks need to be the aggregators, not MSFDC [TransPoint] or the telcos," said Gary Meshell of Benton International in a recent article in American Banker.

Joseph S. Pendleton, a former bank executive with CoreStates Financial Corp., also warned recently in Home Banking and Financial Sen,ices, "There is a significant threat because if you have the scenario where someone like CheckFree or MSFDC [TransPoint] has a direct relationship with a biller, the processor could establish a preferred relationship with a financial institution ... and the bank would lose that relationship with the biller."

The Internet can represent either a struggle for your payment center or a new opportunity to deliver value to your organization. The rewards stand to be great if you combine your expertise in payments and settlement with emerging electronic payment mechanisms. You can offer innovative and profitable solutions to a new set of problems facing all companies-the assimilation of payments from the Internet. E

David R. Lamm

President and CEO

TriSense Software, Ltd.

David R. Lamm is Founder, President and Chief Executive Officer of TriSense Software, Ltd., a Minneapolis-based financial systems software company and maker of the PaySense electronic bill presentment and payment solution. He has overall management responsibility for all aspects of the company, including strategic direction.

Lamm has more than 25 years of seniorlevel experience in the areas of financial systems, product management and marketing, including in-depth expertise in the banking industry. His unique skills involve the ability to take a product from the idea stage to practical functionality, including design, problem solving, implementation and market development.

Prior to forming TriSense in 1996, Lamm established Document Solutions Inc., a Birmingham, AL-based company that pioneered check and statement imaging for the banking industry. Lamm and his partner sold Document Solutions to BISYS, a major bank service company, in 1995. That year, Document Solutions was an $18 million company serving 300 bank clients. He continued to serve as a support and development consultant to BISYS until he formed TriSense.

Lamm also developed two Minneapolisbased start-up companies. In 1978, he founded Concepts in Software, a consulting firm for banking, financial applications and operating systems. Compus, founded in 1971, developed compilers and operating system software for mini-computers.