Key Takeaways:
- Transactional print and mail are still a critical part of business.
- Automation plus personalization turn every statement into a faster paying, cost cutting one-to-one touchpoint.
- Combining print and digital channels gives customers convenience and choice.
Transactional print and mail remain the backbone of revenue operations even as digital channels surge. Yet cost pressures, including the 7.4% USPS rate hike for first-class mail that took effect in July, and rising customer expectations for seamless experiences are forcing organizations to rethink how they create, produce and deliver every invoice, billing statement and notice.
Automation and personalization are converging, giving billers a significant boost to workflow efficiencies, enhancing CX and speeding payments. An advanced omnichannel customer communication management (CCM) platform with embedded transactional print and mail services is quickly becoming the new standard.
Why transactional print and mail still earn their keep
Meeting customers where they are is crucial for billers. While many customers still choose paper first, more than a quarter of consumers (28%) prefer to receive both paper and digital billing statements, according to ACI Speedpay’s 1H 2025 report.
A growing number of billers are leaning into a paper and digital hybrid, adding QR codes and personalized URLs (PURLs) to paper statements that drive consumers to online account management and payment portals, bridging print to digital self-service. Embedding unique QR or text-to-pay links on statements lets customers self-resolve the most common request — “I just need to pay” — without having to call, type in web addresses or find an envelope and stamp.
Automation and specialization raise the bar on accuracy, speed and compliance
The transactional print and mail services leaders differentiate on their expertise. With transactional print providers, HIPAA, PCI-DSS, and SOC 2 Type II security and privacy controls are baked into production. Typical direct marketing or commercial printers focus on CAN-SPAM and postal regulations. Few invest in the same level of data privacy, security and compliance.
The most advanced transactional print and mail providers use high-speed, continuous roll- fed inkjet printers. This equipment is paired with advanced camera systems that read 1,200 pages or more per minute, verifying color, logo integrity, and even dollar totals for checks printed.
Linked systems match inserts, which are scanned as they exit the inserter. Notifications automatically populate the CCM dashboard so the business user can confirm exactly when a mail piece was processed and create a fully automated audit trail, all without human intervention.
Personalization gets smarter and less expensive
Thanks to high-speed printers and dynamic composition engines, a scheduled bill run essentially becomes all one-offs, as technology can swap branding, offers or language on the fly without slowing press speeds. Where personalization once meant a static logo swap, next-gen platforms are layering in contextual prompts (Scan To Pay Now) and targeted inserts and onserts based on real-time account data.
Integrated CCM platforms close the loop
The strongest play is an end-to-end CCM solution that lets teams create, update and approve customer billing and other critical communications from a single platform, then push output to print, email, or text with one click. By unifying channels:
- Workflow bottlenecks disappear. Billing, legal, marketing and compliance review the same live template, eliminating version-control issues and allowing instant updates.
- Customer experience improves. Consumers can choose to receive a statement via mail and email, plus a text reminder on their due date, all driven from the same data set.
- Analytics feed continuous improvement. Delivery time stamps, open rates and payment conversions roll back into the CCM platform, informing the next print run or digital push.
Action checklist for billing teams
Ready to translate these trends into measurable gains? Start with these three steps:
- Audit your workflow. Map and time out every hand-off from document creation, revisions and approvals to printer proofs to postal acceptance. Automation eliminates multiple steps and reduces errors.
- Use data to cut postage. Explore presort commingling, statement householding and regional print production and mailing get statements to the mailbox faster and cheaper.
- Champion omnichannel flexibility. Offer print for trust and compliance, plus digital self-service for convenience and accelerated payments.
Leveraging automation and data-driven personalization with transactional print and mail helps organizations reduce costs, meet compliance deadlines and give customers timely, easy-to-pay statements, without rebuilding their communications stack from scratch. Done right, paper statements arrive on time, carry the information customers need and move cash faster—proof that good print is still good business.
Please contact us to learn more about transactional billing and payments.
