Threats to the financial health of the auto industry and its buyers continue to escalate as vehicle lenders and servicers plan to gather at Auto Finance Summit East 2025 in mid-May.
The troubling situation underscores the need for auto lenders and servicers to leverage the key touchpoints of consumer billing and payments to cultivate engagement and on-time payments while prioritizing lower-cost digital options.
Facing significant economic and industry uncertainty with the potential for devastating impacts, auto finance companies can find certainty in the cost savings and customer experience benefits of offering digital communications and payments.
Visit us at Booth 310 at AFS East 2025 to learn how you can join our growing list of auto finance clients taking a digital-first approach to omnichannel customer communications and payments.
Economic signals flashing red
Recently, it seems many lenders and servicers are slowing their transition to electronic processes. The adoption of digital contracting and documentation workflows inched up 1% in the first quarter of 2025 compared to Q4 2024, according to the Q1 Auto Finance Digital Transformation Index from Wolters Kluwer Compliance Solutions.
Yet it’s an opportune time to actually increase digital investments for consumer billing and payments. Digital transformation of manual and disconnected processes and systems drives cost and operating efficiencies from increased automation, productivity and customer self-service. Digital improvements also are critical to delivering better customer experience that encourages payments, and longer term, builds loyalty and repeat business.
Most customers prefer digital billing statements, payment reminders and payments, and their number is growing steadily, according to ACI Speedpay research. Because the vast majority of consumers conduct digital business on their smartphones, auto finance communications, websites, and payment portals must be optimized for mobile interactions or risk losing customer attention and action.
Leveraging cloud technologies
For cost and CX benefits, auto finance firms can quickly implement and scale cloud platforms for customer communications management (CCM) and electronic bill presentment and payments (EBPP). The gains will include:
Increased automation. This automation goes beyond digitizing physical processes to reworking them to improve efficiency and productivity. With reusable document templates and content library, servicers can streamline composition and production of millions of mail, email and text communications. They simply upload a single data file, and the CCM system automatically inserts text and image elements to customize each statement, payment reminder, letter and other customer communications.
Streamlined processes. Securely accessible from any location,CCM platforms speed up all communications steps, including reviewing documents, generating proofs for sign-off, making document changes and creating reports.
Enhanced compliance. Leading CCM systems allow auto finance firms to track delivery, including automating Certified Mail® with electronic signature capture, as well as create audit trails and archive communication to meet regulatory requirements.
Reduced costs. Cutting back on paper bills and payments saves on mailing and call-center costs when supplemented with online bill presentment, self-service account management and payments.
Improved payments. Consumers want to do businesses that provide choice, ease of use, convenience and seamlessness between customer touchpoints, especially when it comes to billing and payments. A 2023 study by PYMNTS and Mastercard found that 23% of millennials, who incidentally took out the largest auto loans in Q4 2024, according to the New York Fed, prioritize bills that are easiest to pay.
CCM platforms enable companies to offer any combination of email, text messaging and print and mail communications for each customer and to customize the content, messaging and offers in the communications. EBPP systems let customers manage their accounts when they want, including viewing current bills and payment history, making one-time payments, and setting up recurring payments using ACH, credit/debit cards, PayPal and digital wallets such as ApplePay.
By digitally transforming billing and payments, cloud CCM and EBPP platforms offer a clear path forward for auto finance firms to lower costs and improve CX. In a market where many factors are outside of their control, auto lenders and servicers can take control to move in the right direction for their businesses and customers.
Please contact us to learn more about leveraging CCM and EBPP platforms to advance your operations and market position.
