Luis Antonio Rojas/Bloomberg
Health care payments have long suffered from
Fiserv is developing a payment platform designed for small to medium sized health care providers, a move designed to expand Clover beyond retail, restaurant and other general retailers. The company, which has thousands of small business and bank clients, is attempting to offer its mix of payments and merchant services to health care practices.
“There’s a lot of documents and manual processes at the point of pay,” said Katie Whalen, Head of Merchant FI Channels & Small Business Strategy at Fiserv. While payment technology companies have tried to
“This looks like a classic embedded payment acceptance play, adding payment processing to an existing business management platform,” Aaron Press, research director of Worldwide Payment Strategies at IDC, told American Banker.
In the waiting room
Fiserv’s platform, which is scheduled to launch in early 2026, will manage HIPAA and PCI compliance, and will offer financing, payment acceptance, recurring billing, text to pay, QR codes and online payment portals. A branded Clover dashboard will reside alongside the practice’s practice management software. Fiserv is building the platform in partnership with Rectangle Health, a medical office software seller.
“There’s a lot of opportunity to enhance the experience for the consumers, to give them a multi-tender approach,” Fiserv’s Whalen told American Banker, noting Clover has been updated over the past year, adding new tools that can aid automation for the health care industry. Fiserv recently added
Fiserv additionally plans to launch a digital asset platform that includes a stablecoin, FIUSD, which will be interoperable with PayPal’s PYUSD stablecoin.
Read more about digital payments.
In a research note on Fiserv’s Clover, William Blair analysts said the ability to support stablecoin commerce via Clover will provide greater flexibility for smaller businesses and the analyst firm expects Fiserv will maintain its leadership position in merchant processing and financial services.
“Clover has evolved quite a bit,” Whalen said. “And health care is a pretty untapped market.”
Rectangle Health’s practice management system already handles some payment and financial functions, like billing, as part of the overall solution, Press said.
“Health care payments are extremely complex, so adding an embedded point of service payment solution gives medical practices one less vendor to worry about and improves integration into other financial management functions,” Press said.
More providers
Fiserv is planning its foray into healthcare payments as banks increase their attention on the sector.
The growth of self-directed health care plans such as health savings accounts are driving the payment moves, according to payment experts.
“HSAs have driven the need for all healthcare providers, especially smaller care facilities, to upgrade their digital payment capabilities to accept debit card-based HSA remittances,” Richard Crone, a payment consultant, told American Banker.
Healthcare payments have among the highest days outstanding because most are billed post-service, according to Crone, adding the result is 75% of patient bills are paid 30 or more days after service, creating a structural need for real-time settlement. A third of post-service invoices involve billing challenges or disputed claims, Crone said.
“To fill this void, electronic invoice presentment and payment must evolve to include invoice adjudication and reconciliation,” Crone said, adding payment facilitation, which automatically routes transactions based on the least expensive or efficient option, will play a major role in the health care industry. Stablecions and agentic AI, which can speed up payment processing and automate customer service, can also address health care payment complications, Crone said.