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NEXTBILL.COM RELEASES INDUSTRY'S FIRST OPEN SYSTEM PLATFORM FOR B2B and B2C ELECTRONIC BILLING DALLAS, (March 20, 2001)... NextBill.com, Inc., a biller service provider delivering turnkey electronic billing systems to financial and billing institutions, today announced the release of NextBill SourceProT, the first open-system offering in the industry that will allow billers to purchase a single-site source code license and most importantly does not impose transaction fees. NextBill SourceProT represents a major shift in business philosophy from service bureau-style consolidation models and provides institutions with a comprehensive solution for both electronic bill presentment and payment (EBPP) and electronic invoice presentment and payment (EIPP). This release of NextBill SourceProT gives billers complete control of their customers' processing guidelines and Web site presentation, and control over their electronic billing strategy. With NextBill SourceProT, the only third party needed in the electronic billing process is the biller's financial institution. The development of NextBill SourceProT was the direct result of feedback from major billers. Several of the nation's largest billers have already implemented or are in the process of implementing their electronic billing solution in-house because of the high ongoing transaction fees associated with many electronic billing products on the market. "We found that many billers who possess the required technological expertise want the ability to customize their electronic billing product to their own specifications," said Mark Brinkman, NextBill.com's chief operating officer. "Other billers simply need a basic electronic billing package, but find the ongoing transaction fees and setup costs of the available electronic bill presentment and payment models more costly than their current paper-based processes, which would make the costs of electronic billing too high to justify implementation." NextBill SourceProT provides billers with a fully functional electronic billing system in five days, complete with automated import and export of billing data. Additionally, NextBill.com will offer professional services to support NextBill SourceProT implementations such as quick-start installation, co-development, a premium maintenance package, and in-house technical and customer support training. The NextBill system is a paperless, direct billing model, which enables companies to e-mail bills directly to customers. Unlike many other electronic billing models, payments are automatically processed on the invoice due date, or the date assigned by the customer using the Federal Reserve's automated clearinghouse system. No bill is paid unless the user schedules a payment, and payments can be cancelled at any time until the date of the scheduled payment. An annual maintenance fee for the biller will include upgrades and any necessary system updates. "Research over the last two years has shown that the consolidator model has not been addressing the needs of the marketplace. We chose the direct billing model because it provides a simpler, more timely and cost-effective method for billers to present bills, and to receive and process payments," added Brinkman. "After speaking with numerous large billers, we learned that they did not see the electronic billing solutions presently available as viable models because of the high transaction fees and setup costs associated with electronic billing. We delayed our marketing effort last year to prepare our system and source code, allowing NextBill.com to offer the industry's first open system. The market has indicated a preference for the direct billing model for quite some time now, and we know that NextBill SourceProT will allow billers to truly maximize all of the benefits of this efficient, flexible method of billing."
About NextBill.com, Inc.
About Brinkman Technologies, Inc. (BTI) |
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