Social Housing

With the cost of living crisis seeing more and more families struggling and providers needing to support those experiencing hardships, the importance of efficient and effective collection has never been greater.

According to a quarterly survey; mean rent arrears increased to 4.0% during quarter 1, 2020-2021 - the highest rate since 2013. A reliable process to assess things like affordability either at the pretency stage or collection stage is a key mechanism to ensure that tenants are advised appropriately, collection decisions are robust and arrangements sustainable.

Next-generation solution: Open Banking

Payments

Open Banking has opened up a world of possibilities for the payments landscape. By using verified information, Open Banking enables direct and instant payments between two bank accounts with much less risk of error or fraud. No input of sensitive data (such as card details) is required when making a payment.

Cost-effective: bypass card network fees
Instant Settlement: direct account-to-account transfers
Seamless Checkout: no manual input of sensitive data
Secure: fraud eliminated with biometric identification

Open Banking payments can be used for a variety of transactions, allowing councils to initiate instant and direct account-to-account payins and payouts, for example:

  • Rent payments
  • Service charge payments
  • Former tenant arrears
  • Fixed or variable recurring payments

Data

Open Banking can also bring in many data capabilities, such as instant confirmation of account ownership or income verification, providing local authorities with fully accurate financial information extracted from a citizen’s verified bank account data. This technology introduces many key benefits that can transform the way local authorities work:

Identity

Confirm full name, sort code and account number
Verify recurring payment setups
Perform income verification checks
Automate bank account data collection
Eliminate fraud or human error

Affordability

Perform checks on a customer’s ability to afford services
Access detailed categorization of income and expenses in real time
Assess eligibility for welfare support & discretionary grants
Identify financially vulnerable citizens
Offer personalised payment plans

Why Ecospend?

Ecospend has transacted record-breaking volumes of payments since going live on the HMRC website and app. Our Paylink suite of payment solutions provide clients with vast options of payment services to meet the needs of their customers.

Ecospend’s customer journey is seamless and provides a positive streamlined experience for users - a value the whole Public Sector strives to achieve for their customers.

Our award-winning open banking infrastructure has been built on direct relationships with the UK Banking Ecosystem. With no reliance on third parties, Ecospend has the strongest open banking offering in the market. 

Through its direct award with HMRC, Ecospend is in a unique position to bring the benefits of open banking to the whole UK public sector without a procurement process, making our technology capable of being deployed within a matter of weeks.

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