JSU / Playbooks / Payments
How to price your Payments sales bottleneck
Run the same math as the JSU Bottleneck Index on your own Payments numbers in three steps.
The Payments bottleneck prices a single question: what does it cost you per year to be slow and unfocused at first contact? For a typical firm it is around $480,000.
The formula
Annual bottleneck = average deal value × winnable deals lost per quarter × 4. For Payments, that is $30,000 × 4 × 4 = $480,000.
Run it on your real numbers
The published figure is representative. Take your own average deal and your honest quarterly loss to slow and generic follow-up. Retention desks call fast.
- A merchant opens locations or changes POS
- A processor outage or hold freezes cash
- Chargeback rates spike in a vertical you serve
- A software platform opens an integrated-payments seat
Then decide if it's worth closing
Once you have your number, compare it to the cost of fixing speed and aim at first contact. In payments, the leak is almost always the larger figure.
Remember what each variable really represents. The $30,000 is one payments relationship walking out the door. The 4 losses a quarter are not no-fits; they are deals you could have won had you reached the buyer inside the 8 hours window. Multiply by four and you have a full year of revenue that went to whoever simply answered first. That is the figure to price your fix against.
The bottleneck is rarely effort. It is speed and aim at the first touch.
What does a slow merchant follow-up cost?
At $30,000 average annual value per account, four lost merchants a quarter is $480,000 a year. The incumbent's retention desk usually wins the ones you answer late.
Which signals predict a merchant ready to switch?
New locations, POS migrations, processor outages or holds, and chargeback spikes in your vertical.