Happy New Year to all our EPCOR members and friends!
As I begin my fifth year at EPCOR, and EPCOR prepares to celebrate its 15th Anniversary, I am so thankful to our members, the EPCOR Board of Directors and the EPCOR Staff. We’re dedicated to serving you in various work environments – full-time in-office, full-time remote and hybrid. Regardless of location or schedule, we remain your trusted resource, providing payments education, audit and advisory services and member support services to you and your organization, to help you maintain system compliance, improve operational processes and mitigate risk and fraud. We also continue to foster and promote improvements and developments in the U.S. payment system by actively representing you through our participation on industry boards, committees and work groups.
In the evolving payments landscape, we understand the challenges you face – navigating instant payments, understanding and implementing new payment rules, managing compliance and regulatory changes and mitigating fraud - just to name a few. As you map out your payments journey for 2024 and beyond, rely on EPCOR for education, resources, tools, support and advisory services. In addition to the wide array of traditional payments education such as Payment Systems Update and EPCOR Payments Conferences, we have many other offerings to support you, including:
- EPCOR Webinar Subscription – a unique subscription service providing individual user access to all of EPCOR’s 22+ live webinars and recordings available in 2024.
- Electronic Resources License – a cost-effective way to train your entire staff on payment rules and regulations for one flat fee based on the number of employees at your organization. This license also includes helpful tools, forms and guides.
- Audit, Risk Assessment and Advisory Services – navigating the complexities of ever-changing payment systems, members can obtain payment system audits and risk assessments (RTP, Wire, Remote Deposit, ACH and Third-Party Sender), as well as and consulting services, from our team of experts when dealing with specific payment issues or for meeting regulatory compliance requirements. Additionally, we offer a comprehensive Faster Payments Launch Service that prepares members to implement instant payments – RTP® and the FedNow® Service.
- Did You Know Videos – short, animated videos focused on various payment topics that are three to four minutes long and presented in an easy-to-understand format, perfect for sharing with internal staff members and consumer and/or business clients.
- Flex Training – a cost-effective, customized way to educate your staff on payment topics they need to be successful in their jobs.
As EPCOR continues to execute our multi-year strategic plan, here are a few initiatives we are tackling to complement our members with their own strategic initiatives:
- Leveraging our financial resources to implement a new Association Management System (AMS) that will provide members with many self-service options, a new members community, a refreshed EPCOR website and online store.
- Growing EPCOR’s advisory services to include assistance in launching instant/faster payments and treasury management services.
- Ongoing investment in our staff and their professional development and growth at EPCOR.
- Furthering our Educational and Certification Services around instant/faster payments, including on-demand curriculums and a certificate program in preparation for the highly anticipated Accredited Faster Payments Professional exam.
- Continuing to offer best-in-class education that expands our members’ knowledge of and compliance with payments industry rules and regulations through innovative learning experiences.
- Expanding our current payment partnerships to bring value to our members and meet their financial service needs.
- Exhibiting and attending at industry events to highlight the various products and services available to EPCOR members.
- Increasing our engagement with Fintechs and other service providers to support your overall innovation efforts within the payments landscape.
As I prepare for 2024, EPCOR has taught me to remain nimble, flexible and innovative in how we approach new payments education and services that we offer our members. I’m thrilled about the 2024 initiatives happening at EPCOR and the continued excitement and expansion within the EPCOR footprint around instant payments.
All of us at EPCOR wish you a happy New Year. We look forward to seeing you at an EPCOR event soon and continuing to support your payment system needs through 2024 and beyond!