Source: Company, 9/02, and Financial DNA estimates, 2/02

Princeton eCom, founded in 1983 as a communications industry biller, is now a major epayments player. The company serves 1,350 financial institution clients (Q2 2002) with revenue growth a strong 50% YTD compared to a year ago; and 70% in 2001 compared to 2000. Major investors include New Century Equity Holdings Corp., Mellon Ventures, SG Capital Partners, Bottomline Technologies, Terra Lycos Ventures, and BT Investment Partners.

Princeton eCom provides two pay-anyone services, one for consumers and the other for small businesses. Users can make payments online, over the telephone, by wireless device, or auto debit. Payments can be drawn from checking or savings accounts and in some cased charged to credit cards. The company does not market services directly to end-users.

Number of Customers

The company provides integrated bill presentment and payment services to large telecommunication, utility, and financial services companies including 20 Fortune 500 companies. More than 1,400 banks and financial institutions, including eight super-regionals, use pay-anyone payment services.

Table 1

Princeton eCom Transaction Volumes, 2002

Source: Company, 9/02 except, (e) total user base estimate from Financial DNA, 2/02

Pay-anyone bill payment clients
according to company Web site, 9/20/02.

Travelers Express

www.travelersexpress.com

Travelers Express doesn’t yet have a demo of bill presentment, but its pay-anyone bill payment screens are worth a look.

Travelers tells users whether the payment will be paper or electronic (far right-hand column).

Travelers www.travelersexpress.com/bankofburlwood/ features an easy-to-use interface including disclosure of whether the payment is paper or electronic. Users check the box of the bills they want to pay and press the Schedule Payments button. Then, a list of payments is presented complete with the previous payment amount and account the money will be paid from. Travelers supports up to six checking accounts.

Payment scheduling screen at Travelers.

Princeton TeleCom

www.princetontele.com

Princeton TeleCom emphasizes automatic payment options in its bill presentment service. The bottom “Autopay” button can be toggled on or off by the user to have the bill automatically paid on the due date.

Union Electric is using Princeton TeleCom
“Pay-By-Web.”

Union Electric’s www.ue.com payment options page is hosted on Princeton TeleCom’s server, www.princetontele.com/ue . It offers four payment choices:

•  Pay-By-Web
•  The Direct Payment Plan (pre-authorized debit)
•  Pay-By-Phone
•  Budget Billing (averages monthly payments over the year)