E-Billing: the Most Overlooked Green Practice?
How can the average U.S. household save almost a tenth of a tree each year? By switching to electronic bills, statements, and payments, the average household saves 6.6 pounds of paper, avoids producing 171 pounds of greenhouse gas emissions, and saves .079 of a tree annually, reports thePay It Green Alliance.
随着越来越多的企业和消费者拥抱电子填充背后的技术，并看到涉及的涉及时光的好处，因此电子收费的障碍正在消失。电子底漆的环境论点很简单：较少的纸张废物和下部温室气体排放。
电子收费等于储蓄
"The marriage of electronic billing and corresponding electronic payment has a net positive reduction in time," explained George K. Roach, Systems Specialist at Con Edison. "We are saving the expenses related to paper allocation for the bill, as well as the billing and payment return envelopes we send to customers, along with bill inserts or other enclosed items. Electronic billing results in postage savings. Furthermore, the processing costs for electronic payments are lower than the costs for paper bills."
能源巨头有超过300万客户在纽约市和韦斯特切斯特县爱迪生发出很多账单。该公司一直在推广其无纸计费选项，E*账单，并每月招募约6500名消费者，仅2007年就会招收60,000名Con Edison客户。自开始推广绿色计费以来，Con Edison报告说，E-BILLing激活增加了65％，在过去十二个月中，在线电子账单付款增加了20％
Con Edison认为，电子填充是一种“绿色”实践，并且是国家薪酬IT绿色联盟的成员。工资IT绿色联盟始于2007年，其中包括包括美国银行，美联储和AT＆T在内的金融和消费者计费行业的二十名领导人。这Electronic Payments Association(NACHA) leads the Alliance.
这Alliance works to educate consumers about the positive environmental impact of choosing e-bills over paper alternatives. Customers may use the Pay it Green Alliance消费者计算器在他们的网站上找到，以找出通过切换到电子收费和电子付款可以节省多少纸。支付绿色还可以与企业合作，以帮助他们建立和销售电子填充服务。
Utilities and communication companies are actively pushing e-billing service.康卡斯特几年来，他们使用的两个计费系统提供了几年的电子陈述和电子填充形式。康卡斯特（Comcast）付款处理副总裁Patty Thorell表示：“这些系统的最新增强使我们能够普遍烙印并销售Ecobill产品，我们在2008年初引入了Ecobill产品。”“ Ecobill提供了对所有客户抑制纸张陈述的独特沟通。”
BillTrust总部位于新泽西州詹姆斯堡，帮助公司将更多客户迁移到电子计费。他们报告说，提供电子用品的公司可以通过节省材料，邮费和劳动力来降低70％的账单成本。此外，BillTrust报告说，客户对以电子方式收到账单更加满意。
BillTrust营销副总裁Mitch Rose说：“我们使公司很容易外包其账单文件的交付。”“我们的系统旨在允许企业以几乎任何格式向我们发送其计费文件。BillTrust将创建一个账单设计，其外观改进，并根据收款人的偏好发送。我们帮助公司促进E-BILLEDING EX-BILLINGing通过可以在账单上或插入物上放置的消息。”
Accounts payable departments can also achieve significant efficiencies by viewing and paying their bills online. The billing data can be downloaded right into their accounting system. "This saves time and minimizes the chance of data error that can occur with manual data entry," said Rose. "Significant savings are achieved in labor, processing and material costs associated with paying bills. To pay a bill, a company logs into a secure payment site, selects the bills they want to pay and schedules the payment."
教育电子填充
个人消费者是否正在购买电子收费？Billtrust的Mitch Rose说，答案是肯定的。罗斯说：“据塔集团称，将在2008年以电子方式进行近50亿美元的付款。”“消费者接受在线支付作为一种安全便捷的方法正在推动这一趋势。人们可以回到ATM处于收养早期的八十年代中期。今天，许多人不必踏入银行。”
康卡斯特's Thorell added, "We've seen positive customer response as more customers are interested in managing their accounts online and reducing the amount of paper they receive in the mail. In addition, e-billing offers customers the convenience of being able to set up recurring payments to automatically pay their bills each month as well as the ability to access and check their account from any Internet connection. It's also more private and secure because there are no paper statements to dispose of."
| Promoting E-Billing |
| E-billing can have a significant impact on your business, but it will only take off if you have internal and external plans in place to promote it. •Create reasonable goals Understand the legal and financial ramifications of e-billing. In the long term, your company can save time and resources, but it will take time, research, infrastructure upgrades, collaboration with e-bill providers, and employee education. Plan to sign up clients over months and years, not weeks. •Educate Staff and Shareholders 您的员工需要知道电子收费将如何简化他们的工作。您的会计部门的电话更少。更轻松的应收账款付款跟踪。基于更准确，最新信息的智能信用决策。随着电子收费与公司数据库和企业资源计划（ERP）系统的联系，现金流管理变得更加容易。 •向消费者和企业客户传达利益 Let your clients know that seemingly little changes, like getting and paying bills electronically, can add up to a large positive benefit for the environment. Use your existing client communication channels, from bill stuffers to newspaper ads, to spread the word about your e-billing offerings. •拥抱无纸化（或纸质）办公室的环境影响 在日常活动中使用较少的纸张。当您需要纸质副本时，请购买非电源纸。以电子方式支付账单，并使用其他公司的交互式Web响应（IWR）系统。您不仅可以少申请，而且通常可以使用其他公司IWR接口上的信息创建有用的报告。业务正在更改A转向电子填充，可以为员工提供更大的灵活性。 |
An August 2008 survey by information technology providerFiserv发现连续第二年，越来越多的美国家庭在网上支付账单，有6310万家庭通过互联网支付账单。在2008年调查中，消费者对消费者的第一障碍缺乏对电子填充方式的了解。仅13％的受访者列出了对在线安全性的关注。
In fact, the NACHA reports that 85 percent of identity theft cases are from paper transactions like lost checkbooks and statements. The same secure networks that financial and governments use to send electronic ACH payments are used in business-to-business and business-to-consumer transactions.
A 2008 survey sponsored by Checkfree and conducted by Harris Interactive found that approximately 31 million U.S. households use online banking websites to pay their bills, 47.8 million households use bill websites, and 16 million households pay online using both billing and biller sites.
Fifty-one percent of those surveyed in the Harris poll said the environment was the number one reason why they use e-bills and online payments. Paper waste and clutter reduction were listed as the chief benefits of e-billing by 72 percent of respondents. Tree conservation and gas consumption were other reasons for using e-billing.
进一步强调了电子填充与环境之间的联系，Con Edison将电子收费与环境激励措施联系在一起：对于每个选择在线支付公用事业账单的客户，Con Edison向当地的非营利性植树基金捐款1美元，以帮助纽约的环境。
在进行电子填充飞跃之前要考虑什么
技术升级和营销是想要提供电子收费和电子支付的企业的主要费用。进行转换并将新闻传出可能是昂贵的。网站门户也必须非常简单，以免失去消费者。还有另一个要记住的密码可以使人们失望。也许这就是为什么大多数电子账单都转移到基于电子邮件的账单而不是消费者必须访问的网站的原因。
企业还必须确保遵循纳入纳入和美联储的规则和适用的隐私法。使用第三方E-Bill提供商可以帮助确保正确应用所有法律。
随着越来越多的企业客户需要电子票房和24小时的在线访问发票，e-billing并不是企业对企业计费的选择，而是与公司合作的必要条件。但是，在当前的经济不景气中，观看企业对消费者计费的电子收费如何发展会很有趣。消费者在试图节省邮资和汽油资金时会更加转向电子用品吗？还是他们要在厨房的桌子上把纸质账单汇总，想知道并担心先支付哪些账单？
