How to Ensure Fast, Reliable Payments on International Transactions
August 31, 2017By Linda Abbruzzese, Senior International Trade Specialist, Office of Digital Initiatives, U.S. Commercial Service and Patrick Morris, Intern, Office of Strategic Partnerships, Industry and Analysis
U.S. exporters face many challenges when meeting a foreign buyer who is interested in acquiring their product. Knowing how to agree to a sale with a foreign buyer, and understanding how to handle the payment transactions can be challenging and frustrating to the exporter, especially when customers are located thousands of miles away. Frequently, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) do not know how to correctly receive payment for their exports, or fear that once their shipment has left the United States, they will not get paid. It is important for U.S. SMEs to protect themselves and their business transactions by learning the ins and outs of processing international payments, and ensuring that they get paid in the safest and quickest manner possible to protect their sales, products, business, and customers.
The International Trade Administration’s Office of Digital Initiatives has collaborated with Trade Technologies to offer a webinar series on international payments. International payments are made between countries, whether a trade debt, unilateral transfer of funds, capital investment, or another purpose. These payments are vital to businesses, as well as economists and national governments, because international debts can impact accumulated balances of foreign currency, claims on foreign currency, loans from creditor to the debtor, drawings on the International Monetary Fund, or movement of gold. International payments are not only important to SMEs, but they are also pertinent for a country balancing its international accounts for its balance of payments.
Trade Technologies, an International Trade Administration (ITA) Strategic Partner since 2013, is the largest global provider of trade document services and software. Spurred by a mutual interest to help SMEs process international transactions quickly and reliably with fewer errors and lower costs, ITA and Trade Technologies is presenting this webinar series that concludes in October 2017. Richard “Chip” Thomas, an international banker and founder of The American Export Training Institute leads the webinars. The sessions explore transaction methods that enable U.S. SMEs to get paid in the most efficient way while maintaining their competitive advantage in the market. Specific topics of consideration include letters of credit, INCOTERMS 2010, documentation discrepancies in the letters of credit, and payment terms.
For more information about the webinar series, please contact Linda.Abbruzzese@trade.gov or click here to register.
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