For those who know me, I spend a lot of time thinking through issues that nag at me. According to my husband, I talk about them a lot as well. Lately, I have been spinning away on the recent Federal Reserve Payments Study results, measured in 2009. According to the study, from 2006 to 2009 business use of paper checks for payment to other businesses (B2B) dropped a whopping 2%! No offense to those who have moved the needle, but seriously...is that the best we can do? Sure big business is all over electronic payments. But according to the US Census Bureau, in 2004 they accounted for only 17,000 of the over 5.6 million businesses who had employees (there were another 17 million businesses with no employees...sounds like another issue to blog about).

Follow me on this....so well over 5.6 million businesses who were paying other businesses for products or services migrated to e-payments by 2% in 3 years. Folks, this is nothing to celebrate. In fact, it's just sad. When are we going to eliminate the dependency on paper checks if we keep this "feverish pace"? Never.

So go back to the numbers. If you take 17,000 (large companies; more than 500 employees) away, you still have 5.6 million small and medium sized businesses. I realize the Census is underway right now and this number might be different, but humor me. There are potentially 5 million opportunities to really make a difference here! I am tired of hearing about what's happening in Europe! Congrats to the folks across the pond for outpacing us in their adoption of electronic payments for B2B transactions. There, I said it!

What are WE going to do about it? The White House and State Governors across the country are hanging their hats on the small and medium sized businesses and their impact on the economy. I say we join them!

I have made "2%" my Raison d'être! It's a French phrase meaning "reason for existence." (quick shout out to Mercy High School's foreign language department). And my target is the small and medium sized business. And my weapon? The small to medium sized financial institution! Calling all community banks and credit unions! What do you plan to do about "2%"? How do you feel about 5 million opportunities?

You can expect The Payments Authority (and me personally) to spend some quality time on "2%". In fact, of the six overarching strategic objectives we have for 2011, "2%" is a driving force behind 4 of them. So when the FRB does their payment study again in a couple years, perhaps we will have something to celebrate in the B2B space. How do you plan to deal with "2%"?