While originally positioned as a temporary measure in the early days of COVID-19, by March many businesses will have operated and thrived in a remote-only capacity for a full year, proving that the unplanned social experiment works and is sustainable. As such, many businesses are starting to see the merits of making this shift permanent for millions of workers across the country, and employees are viewing work from home policies as a bona fide benefit that will likely influence where (and for whom) they want to work for. In short, ‘work from home’ will be a tough bell to unring.
As nice as this workplace shift might sound, there are various logistical hurdles to consider for businesses who want to make remote-working permanent. One of the biggest is figuring out how to intercept and deposit all the checks currently being mailed to the office so as not to disrupt cash flow. Thankfully, that is exactly what establishing a lockbox can accomplish.
By migrating the payment remittance address out of the corporate office and outsourcing mail-based payment processing to a lockbox processor, businesses permanently and effectively neutralize risk by solving the problem of figuring out what to do if employees can’t get into the office, and remove a very real stumbling block to transitioning to a permanent work from home arrangement.
With a lockbox, all payments are picked up, all checks are deposited, all documents are imaged, and all information needed to reconcile receivables payments are automatically sent to the appropriate stakeholders regardless of who or where they may be. Access to data and images can be added, removed, or transitioned, so the ability to deposit and post payments becomes completely insensitive to employee turnover (or unanticipated extended absences which have been all too common during the pandemic). Lockbox can also function as a document imaging service, scanning mail-based correspondence that isn’t check payment, making us a one stop shop for all mail that used to come through the office door.
Contact us if you would like to learn how to effectively social distance your receivables from the office, and for anyone wishing to set up lockbox service, we would be happy to put you in touch with any of our partner banks to help facilitate its establishment. While gathering around the water cooler to discuss the latest Breaking Bad or Game of Thrones episode may be a thing of the past for many workers, getting mail-based receivables processed on time doesn’t have to be.
Lighthouse Payment Services is a third-party lockbox service provider who can help maximize the synergy of your cash management offerings and social distance your receivables. Come and see what we can do for you.