In today’s fast-moving world, efficiency is everything—especially when it comes to getting paid. For wedding and event venues, vendors and planners still relying on manual bank transfers, the hidden costs in time, risk, and admin load are substantial. Using a CRM with integrated digital bank transfers can revolutionize your financial workflows. So I am talking about digital ACH (US & Canada), BACS (UK) and SEPA (EU).
I have worked in the events industry for 20 years, and before that I trained as a professional accountant. I know and understand the wedding and events industry and how important it is to have a highly functional accounting and payments system. I have seen time and time again how companies loose so much time, money and resources managing manual bank transfers, checking bank accounts for lodgements, trying to identify what funds came from what booking! There is a better way. Wedding and events are complicated, it is important to make getting paid easy.
Here’s why digital bank payments are defining the future.
1. Speed and Automation: No More Chasing Payments
Manual bank transfers require back-and-forth emails, copy-pasting account details, and manual reconciliation—every time. When payments are initiated and tracked directly from your CRM with digital bank transfers:
- Your client portal will include the payment link - one click and paid!
- Clients can pay instantly and receive a digital PDF receipt instantly.
- Transfers are automatically logged to a specific booking, and reconciled into your accounting platform instantly!
Result: Faster payments, fewer delays, and more time for your team to focus on growth, not admin.
2. Reduced Human Error
Manual transfers are notorious for errors: wrong bank codes, duplicate payments, clients paying incorrect amounts (requiring refunds), forgotten remittance notes, reconciling payments to the worng events and more...... When digital bank transfers are initiated through a CRM:
- Double-payment, incorrect payment amounts, refunds are eliminated.
- Payments are always associated with the correct customer record or invoice.
Result: No mistakes, No refunds, fewer frustrated clients and event managers!
3. Improved Cash Flow Visibility
With manual transfers, accounts managers have to reconcile bank statements manually to specific events, hoping they have enough on the bank statement to identify which one belongs to which — this process can often take days or even weeks after a payment is made, often with only one person in a company having authority for bank account access.
When digital bank payments happen within your CRM client portal you can:
- See payment status in real-time - everyone on the team, not just the person with access to the bank account.
- Generate accurate cash flow forecasts - (which happens automatically in BriteBiz).
- Track pending and failed payments proactively - in real time
Result: You know exactly where your money is, and what is paid. No more .. "Can you check the bank account and see if that client has paid please, they are on the phone and want to know if we received it"!!
4. Enhanced Client Experience
We live in a digital age. Clients want digital experience at every level (they don't want to be given bank details they have to setup in their bank account). Digital bank transfers offer a seamless experience for your customers:
- No need for clients to manually setup your bank details.
- No clunky client experience, or not being able to confirm receipt of payment as the accounts manager is not in.
- Ability to save payment info for future use (with proper authorization).
- It is transparent - and impressive for clients who want a digital experience.
Result: Less friction = faster payments = happier clients.
5. Automated Contracts and Reminders
With a CRM like BriteBiz, you can link signature and digital bank transfer to a SmartDoc. This means that your client can sign and pay a contract in one go (you are not depending on physical bank transfers to confirm the contract). And funds directly to your bank account with no credit card fees. With SmartDocs, you can also automatically:
- Send auto follow-ups and payment reminders.
- Notify clients of followon charges that they can also pay digitally in client portal.
Result: You collect faster, without needing to chase. Signature and payment in one workflow, less admin.
6. Security and Compliance
Manual bank transfers often involve emailing bank details and trusting customers to enter them correctly. This leaves room for mistakes and errors. Digital bank transfers:
- Use secure payment gateways and coding.
- Minimize data exposure and reduce fraud risk.
Result: More secure payments with less liability.
7. Lower Transaction Fees
Compared to credit cards, digital bank transfers (ACH, BACS, SEPA) have significantly lower fees than credit card transactions.
Result: You keep more of what you earn! It's a win win.
8. Scalability
Manual payments don’t scale, the more you grow, the more admin you have to handle. As you grow, if you use digital bank transfers:
- Additional volume of transactions does not increase admin load.
- Mistakes, misallocations, refunds, owner/staff burnout will not increase.
- You will be ahead of the curve and client satisfaction will also increase.
With BriteBiz-connected digital banking scales effortlessly. Whether you’re processing 10 or 1,000 payments per month, the system handles it the same way.
Result: Your accounting function stays lean, even as your events and revenue grows.
Final Thoughts
Digital bank transfers within your CRM aren’t just a convenience—they’re a strategic advantage. They will save you a significant amount of money, increase client satisfaction and reduce admin load in the office. They are now an essential part of modern wedding and event management.
By automating how you request, receive, and reconcile payments, your business becomes more efficient, secure, and scalable.
If you're still handling payments manually, now’s the time to make the switch. Your bottom line—your clients—and your team—will thank you.
Case Study - Bentley Events
Nicola Johnson, Accounts Manager with Bentley Events, changed from Manual Bank Transfers to BriteBiz Digital Bank Transfers. She commented the following.
"With Manual Bank Payments, there were so many individual cumbersome steps, chasing the money to begin with, checking the bank constantly to see if it has been paid, before you can chase again and again. Then manually reconciling every payment, letting the team know, and sending a receipt to client. Identifying which payment belownged to which event was often a problem.
I would estimate that the admin time for each separate manual payment could amount to as much as 0.5 hour (from chasing right through to reconciling and acknowledging). It is very time consuming! There is also room for error, and this is common. The client may often transfer an incorrect amount - this is a real headache having to chase their bank details if there is a refund, or chasing them again if underpaid!
We then changed to BriteBiz Digital Bank Transfers, and Wow....... it totally changed everything about managing accounts. No more sharing bank details, the clients pay in the client portal and generate their own receipt. Everyone on the team knew exactly when clients paid. No more refunds, errors, trying to match payments with no description to an event. So much easier, so much less stressful with so many payments being made. We love it, cannot recommend digital bank payments enough. Huge time and cost saving".
Cost Benefit Analysis
For a venue managing 150 events per year, with 4 payments per event, this is a total of 600 payments per year. From our research, account managers are spending 20 - 30 minutes per manual payment between chasing, checking the bank constantly for payments, manually reconciling, notifying the team, creating and sending manual confirmations of receipt, and undoing all errors such as funds going to the wrong account, incorrect payment amount and other errors.
This is a total admin time of
600 x 30 minutes = 300 hours
This equates to 37.5 working days considering an 8 hour working day.
MANUAL TRANSFER COST - Considering $40/£40 per hour labour cost (incl employment tax), this is $/£12,000 per annum.
DIGITAL TRANSFER BENEFITS - This is just the cost analysis of manual payments. The benefits are also significant in terms of client satisfaction, staff retention, reduction in burnout and more.
SAVINGS - If you are moving from credit card payments to digital bank transfers, there will also be a significant additional saving.
We like to say that manual bank transfers cuts out the middle man. You are no longer dependent on somebody to act between your CRM and the bank. Everyone is on the same page, all of the time, you and your client. It's accounting harmony!
To future proof your business, and streamline your payment and accounting process, contact a member of our team today.
