Alex Burridge, Vertical Marketing Manager
2025 was a transformational year for Paymentus and the billing and payments industry as a whole. Affordability challenges continued to impact almost all consumers and organizations, while innovative technologies such as artificial intelligence found expanded use cases within the space.
2025 also saw the continued rise of credit cards and digital wallets, as well as increased demand for self-service personal assistants like chatbots. And yet, for all the change, paper- and cash-based payments maintained a foothold, particularly among the millions of unbanked consumers within the U.S.
Against this backdrop, here are three billing and payment resolutions we recommend all organizations make to maximize success in 2026.
Resolution #1: Make Billing, Payments, and Engagement More Personal
No, we don’t mean it like they do in action movies (“This time, it’s personal!”), we mean it from the standpoint of making your customer feel like every interaction is unique to their needs and preferences.
Hotels are a perfect example of this. Say you are a hotel chain member. You get their rewards, they save your information, your name is on the TV when you check in. It’s all seamless and tailored to you, which is how these chains create stickiness and loyalty with their customers.
Your billing and payment solution should really be considered an engagement solution. It’s likely your most frequent customer touchpoint, which offers it the unique ability to drive customer satisfaction. To that end, we recommend:
Resolution #2: Simplify
You may look at the list above and think that simplicity is contradictory. Nothing could be further from the truth. The ideal billing and payments solution will bring a host of dynamic capabilities to your organization, all while making it simpler to make and receive payments, track performance, operate across departments, and secure the end-to-end platform.
Yes, this can sometimes be complex. Your iPhone makes it simple to make calls, send texts, check emails, and pay bills—but it’s far from a simple machine. That’s why it’s important to work with a partner that can manage complexity, tame it, and use it to deliver an experience that’s easy to navigate. We recommend:
Resolution #3: Commit to Service
Culturally, it’s crucial to consider that the ideal outcome of every bill is not getting paid—it’s offering an experience that makes customers prioritize your bill going forward. Think of the bills you pay first. Do you find that the easiest bill to pay is the one that gets paid first? That’s the result of a carefully crafted strategy built around customer service.
Much like Paymentus works tirelessly to create long-lasting relationships by dedicating ourselves to your success, your organization should view each transaction as a building block toward greater loyalty. This can lead to more on-time payments, longer customer relationships, a greater willingness to try new payment methods or channels that may be more beneficial to your organization, or by simply offering the benefit of the doubt should there be a bump in the road.
The recommendation here is clear: Become a service-oriented organization that views every touchpoint as an area of opportunity—to improve, to grow, to delight, to simplify, and to support. As we like to say, the real work begins after the customer has been acquired. Let’s make 2026 the year we work even harder to deliver a level of service that turns a customer today into a customer for life.
Get your 2026 started right. Contact us to schedule an exclusive demo to see how the Paymentus billing, payment, and engagement solution can help you realize your organization’s goals, and bring your most pressing resolutions to life.
