Connect to a vendor and set up ePayments

Many of our customers enjoy paying vendors using our ePayment feature because there’s no waiting for checks to arrive, no trips to the bank, and payments go directly to the vendor's bank account! The fastest way to connect is to invite each vendor to be paid electronically, or enter your vendor's bank info if you have it.

Jump to:

• What's an ePayment?
• Send an invitation when adding a vendor
• Resend an invitation if the vendor's email address changes
• Enter the vendor's bank information manually
• Things to know

What's an ePayment?

An ePayment is another name for a direct deposit, which is a term used to refer to electronic bank-to-bank money transfers that are processed through the Automated Clearing House (ACH) network.

Most vendors prefer ePayments over paper checks, since they’re generally very quick, prevent trips to the bank, and deposit directly to the vendor's bank account. Here’s how it works:

1. You send an invite to a vendor you want to transact with via ePayments, or you add their bank information manually.
2. The vendor accepts your invitation, or we verify the bank info you manually entered.
3. You can start scheduling ePayments with the vendor once the vendor accepts the invite, or we verify the manually entered bank as valid.
   

Check out the next sections for steps to invite a vendor or add their bank information manually

Send an invitation when adding a vendor

When you add a vendor, we'll first check to see if the vendor info you enter matches any of our existing vendors. If we find a match, you can connect with the suggested vendor to send them ePayments, or you can continue to add the vendor as a new vendor and invite them to accept ePayments.

1. Select Contacts
2. Select Add contact and Add vendor
3. Enter the vendor's name and account number if you have one
   • If we find any existing vendors that match the name and account number, we'll show you a list. If you see a match in the list presented, select Add next to the vendor that matches, then select continue to complete the connection to the vendor and add them to your contacts. If the vendor has a bank added to their account, you can now schedule ePayments for them.
   • If you don't see a match, move to step 4 below.
4. Select continue to add this vendor
5. Enter the remaining details for the vendor, and select Continue
6. Select ePayment for the payment method, and select Vendor will provide bank account info
7. Enter the vendor's email address, and select Add vendor
   

We'll save the vendor to your contacts list, and send the vendor an invite to connect & enter their bank info so you can schedule ePayments for them. A banner on the vendor's detail page lets you know we're waiting for them to accept the invitation.

Tip: You can still schedule check payments to the vendor while waiting on them to accept the invite and add bank info for ePayments.

Resend an invitation if the vendor's email address changes

If you need to resend an invitation to a new email address, you can do that if the vendor hasn't accepted the invite yet.

1. Select Contacts and select Vendors for the contact type
2. Select the vendor's name
3. Select Edit
4. Edit the vendor's email address and select Save
5. We'll ask you to confirm that you'd like to resend the invite to the updated email address. Select Send email to confirm and resend the invite. The old invite will be invalid.

Enter the vendor's bank information manually

If the vendor gives you their bank information, you can manually enter it into their vendor record within Key CashFlow.

1. Select Contacts
2. Select Add contact and Add vendor
3. Enter the vendor's name and account number if you have one
   • If we find any existing vendors that match the name and account number, we'll show you a list. If you find a match in the list presented, select Add next to the vendor that matches, then select continue to complete the connection to the vendor and add them to your contacts. If the vendor has a bank added to their account, you can now schedule ePayments for them.
   • If you don't find a match, move to step 4 below.
4. Select continue to add this vendor
5. Enter the remaining details for the vendor, and select Continue
6. Select ePayment for the payment method, and select I'll provide their bank account info
7. Enter the vendor's bank account info and select Save
   

In 1-2 business days, we’ll send a test deposit of $ 0.01 (one cent) to your vendor's bank account to confirm it's able to receive payments, and this won’t be re-debited. We’ll also send an email notification to your vendor that you've added their bank information for payments.

If the test deposit isn’t successful, we’ll invalidate the bank account, and notify the vendor. You’ll need to add a new bank account for the vendor if you want to send ePayments. Until you add a new bank account, the payment method will default back to a check.

Things to know

• A connection is complete when the vendor accepts the invitation, but you can't send ePayments until they add a valid bank account.
• Vendor invitations expire after 60 days
• If your vendor needs help setting up their account, or you want to see what they see, you can check out the How your invited vendors set up their account article.
• Because all bank information is encrypted once entered into Key CashFlow, we’re unable to download or export a vendor’s bank information.