Page 26 - gs250801

CoverStory

2. Leveraging AI in the broader ecosystem

AI fear versus function: AI—it's crawl, walk, run. AI is not going to take over.
Why payment pros are leaning in One thing for sure: learn how to use AI. Learn how to
write prompts for AI. AI is going to make your job easier
While much of the public discourse about artificial to do. Will it replace employees?
intelligence centers on fear, particularly in creative Employees that know how to use AI and program AI
industries where AI models have been trained on will get hired before people who do not know how to
copyrighted works without consent, the payments use AI.
industry appears to be embracing AI with confidence.
Unlike sectors just beginning to grapple with digital 3. Use of AI in the future
disruption, the payments industry has long been
shaped by evolving technologies, from the first AI is going to be interesting to watch to see how it is
used by processors, gateways, card brands, fraud and
electronic transactions to EMV adoption to real-time
payments. more. Many times, when people are talking about AI,
they are also talking about automation. It's best to take a
hybrid approach—humans using AI—everyone needs to
In industries like publishing and journalism, job start using AI and incorporate it into their day.
loss and intellectual property concerns dominate
conversations. But in payments and fintech, AI is These are tools that can help you with your business.
largely viewed as an accelerator rather than a threat.
As advisory board contributors noted, AI is already Rod Hometh
improving everything from fraud prevention and RPY Innovations
underwriting to sales enablement and customer
support. Good questions! Here is my input.

Companies like Betterpay Group and Nationwide 1. On implementing AI in your business:
Payment Systems are using AI for daily operations, RPY is a payments consulting firm, and one of our
merchant analysis, contract reviews and knowledge core businesses is guiding clients through their AI
management. Consultants like RPY Innovations implementations for underwriting and risk management.
emphasize the importance of strategic data usage We've learned that the most critical first step is advising
and caution against generic AI applications, favoring clients to build a robust data strategy, because even the
tailored, high-impact use cases. most advanced AI is only as good as the data it's trained

on. Our most significant successes have come from
The industry’s long-standing comfort with helping clients define narrow, high-impact use cases
automation, along with a culture of continual first, which ensures a clear and measurable return on
optimization, may explain why payment professionals their investment.
are moving forward with AI not out of fear, but out of
opportunity. In this sphere, AI isn’t replacing people; 2. On AI in the broader ecosystem:
it’s helping them do their jobs better.
From RPY's consulting vantage point, we see the
payments industry achieving its most effective results
to four times a week. The amount of fraud and stolen using AI for real-time fraud mitigation and creating
identities is nuts. We have a POS vendor that enabled AI, personalized merchant financing and loyalty programs.
so the merchants can ask it a question, for example, how We advise our clients to be wary of the hype around
do I batch out? general-purpose AI. For instance, some AI chatbot
projects have underdelivered because they lacked the
How do I add an employee? How do I update a price? specialized knowledge required for complex payment
Instead of calling the help desk or searching through the inquiries. The real value lies in applying AI to solve
FAQ, merchants can get answers quickly. specific, well-defined payment challenges.

This has cut down on calls to the help desk and led to 3. On the future of AI in the industry:
happy customers.Sometimes getting an answer requires Looking ahead, we see our consulting practice focused on
calling support. Service reps can search on the POS helping clients leverage AI to build hyper-personalized
screen, in the manager app, in the employee app and payment journeys and navigate the complexities of
online. AI-driven compliance and regulation (RegTech). Our
primary concern is mitigating algorithmic bias and
The POS vendor is also working on menu pricing to ensuring model transparency. We believe RPY's role
help businesses see if their menus are priced correctly, will be to provide the essential human oversight and
in addition to using a few other AI tools merchants can strategic validation that ensures our clients' AI initiatives
use. are both effective and responsible.

26