Volt, the worldwide real-time funds platform, immediately publicizes its partnership with Bumper, a cost platform for automobile dealerships, to harness the facility of open banking and real-time funds so that customers pays for automobile deposits, repairs, elements, providers and even buy automobiles outright.
This partnership comes amidst a rebound in UK automobile gross sales, as extra had been offered within the UK in 2023 than in any 12 months because the Covid-19 pandemic, with used automobile gross sales notably booming, experiencing 5.5% year-on-year development in Q3 2023. This rebound is already being mirrored in Volt and Bumper’s gross sales quantity, as since dealerships started rapidly adopting the mixing in January 2024, greater than £3 million in funds has been processed within the UK, with some clients utilizing Volt to purchase vehicles outright.
Volt now powers Bumper’s ‘Pay Now’ perform, facilitating these automotive funds, with dealerships receiving the good thing about on the spot settlements, that are tracked in actual time. Serving to to digitise dealerships, the mixing additionally permits checkout movement and pay-by-link choices, offering a mobile-first expertise to the service automobile dealerships present.
The collaboration addresses a key ache level for dealerships by eliminating friction brought on by sluggish settlement occasions. With the liberty of figuring out funds settle immediately, dealerships achieve higher management over their money movement and stock, additionally lowering the chance of non-payment or system errors. Volt’s integration is at the moment accessible within the UK, however will later launch in additional European nations, as a part of Bumper’s European enlargement plans.
Volt and Bumper’s collaboration exhibits that when retailers actively push open banking funds, clients are pleased to make use of them, reporting safer and safer experiences; serving to to drive UK open banking adoption in a pivotal 12 months of the expertise’s growth. The partnership brings open banking funds to clients of over 5,000 dealerships all through the UK, together with a number of of the world’s main automotive producers, akin to Audi, Ford, Porsche and Volkswagen.
Commenting on the information, Richard Drury, VP of Partnerships at Volt, mentioned: “For automobile dealerships, the funds course of has been a serious problem and our resolution is an actual asset in assuaging these challenges many dealership house owners are going through immediately. We’ve created an ideal resolution for Bumper, with the preliminary outcomes and fast adoption proving that it resonates with each consumers and sellers. There’s enormous potential for real-time funds to take off within the automotive trade, so this partnership was a no brainer for Volt.”
Jack Allman, CCO and Co-Founder at Bumper, added: “The transfer to Volt as Bumper’s Open Banking cost supplier can have a big impact on performance for our partnered dealerships and their clients, offering them with a frictionless account-to-account cost expertise.
“This new partnership enhances our open banking infrastructure with elevated performance together with settlement accounts, real-time notifications and refunds. These developments will enhance operational effectivity and automation throughout all customers, whether or not they work in accounts, gross sales or service. Moreover, Volt’s international cost community facilitates Bumper to roll out our Open Banking product throughout Europe within the close to future. We’re extremely excited to have launched this subsequent part of our Open Banking platform and may’t wait to see the elevated worth this new iteration will carry to our companions.
Having introduced partnerships with Shopify and Worldpay final 12 months, working with Bumper marks one other step in Volt’s development journey, which features a profitable Sequence B funding spherical and Australia enlargement in 2023. In the meantime, Bumper has began 2024 on a excessive, elevating £40m in its personal Sequence B funding spherical, fuelling plans to launch in additional European nations this 12 months, which Volt’s international funds community will assist facilitate.