SMEs (Small and Medium Enterprises) are dominant in developing countries and are emerging at a faster pace more than ever before. With this in mind, they are the ones that are most often affected by any restrictions in cross-border payment systems particularly when it has to do with developing global e-commerce.
Ripple and American Express were present at the Money 20/20 Europe discussion in which many issues were addressed concerning SMEs and cross-border payments. The discussion involved Marcus Treacher, Joy Macknight, and Colin O’Flaherty from American Express and was particularly focused on finding solutions to global payments important to SMEs.
For SMEs to grow, they must be confident that their customers receive payments. It is important to know that normal global payments consist of different intermediates which radically slows down payments. It also produces margin for error. With this in mind, about 60% of inter-business cross-border payments need some kind of manual interference which slows down payments, according to a study made by Mckinsey.
The different cross-border payment problems that SMEs face these days were a “bone of contention” for the conversation between Joy Macknight, Deputy Editor of The Banker, Colin O’Flaherty, American Express’s Vice President & General Manager of global commercial services in the United Kingdom and Russia, and lastly, Marcus Treacher, who is Ripple’s SVP of Customer’s success.
“Ripple offers instantaneous, point-to-point conversations between the sender and receiver of funds. This provides a real opportunity to alleviate most of the issues that customers are facing.”
These were the words of Colin O’ Flaherty. However, American Express recognizes the problems SME’s are facing concerning cross-border payments, its open-forum is suggested as a resource to assist SME’s.
American Express, on the other hand, knows the issues that small-scale businesses meet with normal banks from cross-border payments to access to credits. American Express’s “Open Forum” could be a platform that helps to boost SME
Ripple’s support would enhance these SMEs and the companies collaborating with it are succeeding to address the issues that clients face when international payments are made. Ripple has offered a long-lasting solution, xCurrent, a more prominent way that makes use of blockchain technology to facilitate cross-border. This latest link is from American Express clients in a vital way that the infrastructure takes care of offering the best experience to everyone.
As the discussion came to a halt, O’Flaherty confirmed that the aim of American Express is to build more on the success rate that it has achieved and offer Ripple-enabled services used all over the world.
Right now, there are already testimonies from American Express that they witness better payment services in the United States due to the blockchain technology by Ripple, resulting in a decrease in the number of complaints involving payments in businesses.
Ripple (XRP) and American Express collaborating together will benefit customers by ensuring that they get the best experience. In the discussion, the VP of American Express closed with this:
“American Express’s intention is to expand based on successes to date –to focus on making Ripple-enabled services available across new global corridors with the large transaction flows.”
