Global businesses want incoming payments to be fast, secure, and cost-efficient. But there's often a frustrating and costly gap between issuing an invoice and actually receiving the cash, commonly referred to as the cross-border invoice-to-cash cycle. Especially when international transactions are involved, this gap isn’t just an inconvenience; it’s a risk to cash flow.
In a recent survey of more than 300 finance leaders in mid-market businesses;
- 55% lose 4–5% of revenue monthly due to payment inefficiencies.
- 23% report losses of 6–10% from high wire fees, processing costs, and hidden bank charges.
- 89% say too much bandwidth is tied up in managing payments.
- 90% believe cross-border complexities limit global growth.
Fees involved in cross-border B2B payments:
How much it costs you to get paid
Let’s take two common methods of making B2B payments – wire transfers and credit cards.
Wire Transfers
When an international client pays by wire transfer, several fees apply. Depending upon the bank and banking relationship, fees vary and include:
Your clients will pay:
- Sending fee. Your client will pay a fee charged by the bank sending the wire.
- FX fees related to currency conversion. Banks will charge fees to convert the funds, known as an exchange rate markup.
Your business will pay:
- Receiving fee. Many times the bank receiving the wire will charge a fee. The incoming wire fee is generally charged on a per item basis.
- Intermediary bank fees. Banks in between who play a part in moving the money may charge a fee, and that is often assumed by the business. That fee is taken from the value of the transaction.
- FX fees related to currency conversion. Banks will charge fees to convert the funds, known as an exchange rate markup.
Credit Cards
When clients pay by credit card, you’ll pay a fee to your payment acquirer or processor to accept those payments. That fee is bundled, but when broken out includes:
- the acquirer or processor’s margin
- the fee from the card networks (such as Visa or Mastercard)
- the so-called interchange fee from the issuer bank (such as Citi or Bank of America)
When accepting payment from a different country, you’ll pay all that plus an international card fee charged by the acquirer. This is not counting any of the fees that the payer may be incurring – which, when using an international card, can add up to 4% or more.
Lack of clarity around these fees causes a lot of issues, including:
- The payment is short. Confusion and lack of clarity over FX fees (the mid-market rate is rarely available to the typical consumer) often result in the payment being short of the full amount and needing to chase down the payment.
- The payment is late. Wire transfers take days and are affected by bank holidays and weekends, banking hours, and other factors that can delay the payment.
- Cash flow is difficult to forecast and predict. When there is little visibility into when cash is coming and if it will arrive in the correct amount, it is more challenging to forecast and determine a strategy for investment in the region.
- Ease of handling partial payments and discounting. Settlement speed can affect the timeliness of payment to meet terms and incentives, for instance, for early payment. When a wire transfer arrives, it must be manually matched to the open invoices to which it applies.
- Ensuring compliance with regulations and laws in different countries. There are many things to consider in the cross-border invoice-to-cash process—from the way an invoice needs to be delivered to whether there are legal requirements for it to be translated into local languages, ensuring the payment is secure, and much more.
- Impact of additional manual work on your team. With no new headcount, existing staff will now need to monitor incoming wire payments, match them to open invoices, answer customer questions about their invoices, and much more.
How can you reduce the cost of getting paid, streamline operations, and boost customer satisfaction?
Without Flywire: The traditional model
Many global businesses rely on a patchwork of merchant services and bank accounts to receive payments. These traditional solutions come with:
- Unclear and high merchant processing fees (up to 3%+ per transaction)
- Unclear foreign exchange rate markups that lead to short payments
- Wire transfer fees average $20+ per transaction
- Poor payment visibility and manual reconciliation
As businesses scale internationally, these costs quietly accumulate, hurting margins and delaying growth.
With Flywire: Optimizing the way you get paid
Flywire helps businesses streamline the cross-border invoice-to-cash process, , offering localized payment methods, automating invoicing, improving reconciliation accuracy, and accelerating global cash flow.
- Lowering merchant fees
- Providing transparent, competitive exchange rates
- Reducing wire transfer costs
- Offering local payment methods in 140+ currencies
- Integrating seamlessly with A/R systems to automate reconciliation
Flywire’s seamless integrations with A/R systems enable end-to-end accounts receivable automation, helping finance teams eliminate manual processes and reduce human error. Companies like MSSC and Basis Technologies have seen firsthand how Flywire reduces costs, improves efficiency, and delivers better payment experiences globally.
MSSC: Reduce banking fees, refactor savings into building client relationships
A full 26% of MSSC’s business comes from international customers – most of whom pay invoices by wire transfer. As its international customer base grew, so too did the cost of intermediary bank fees assumed by MSSC, as well as the need to provide more payment methods and flexibility in options to their customers around the world.
Executive Vice President Mike Strope set out to streamline the cross-border receivables process to save bank fee costs, speed payment and ultimately get product into the hands of customers faster to sustain and build relationships.
Basis Technologies: Enhancing payment efficiency
Basis Technologies, a digital marketing firm, encountered difficulties with cross-border payments, including manual processing and delayed settlements. By integrating Flywire with their NetSuite ERP system, they automated payment processes, allowing clients to pay in local currencies and preferred methods.
This integration reduced Days Sales Outstanding (DSO), saved 10 hours weekly on manual processing, and doubled the volume of digital payments shortly after implementation.
See how your business can save
Use our calculator to estimate current fees and potential savings with Flywire.