Over the years, B2B buying has become increasingly digital. Paper order forms, purchase orders, and phone calls no longer make up the bulk of these transactions. According to Capital One, approximately 80% of B2B sales were made through e-commerce channels in 2025, representing more than $32 trillion in transaction volume.
For merchants, that shift creates both opportunity and pressure. Businesses that rely exclusively on mail order/telephone order (MOTO) transactions may be missing an important sales channel or creating unnecessary friction for customers who prefer to purchase online.
However, B2B e-commerce is not simply consumer e-commerce at a larger scale. The payment requirements are often more complex, and standard online payment systems don’t always account for those differences.
For example:
- Corporate purchasing card transactions may qualify for lower interchange rates, but only when the required Level 2, Level 3, or CEDP transaction data is submitted during settlement.
- Many businesses still prefer to pay by ACH (sometimes due to procedural preference, other times due to the complications of transaction limits on their corporate purchasing cards), yet still expect the convenience of making these payments through an online portal.
- Long-term customer relationships often lead merchants to store payment credentials for recurring purchases. This makes life much easier for their accounting teams, but it introduces additional security and compliance considerations.
As a result, B2B merchants are often better served by payment solutions designed around their specific workflows rather than systems built primarily for consumer transactions.
How B2B Payment Processing Differs from B2C
Consumer e-commerce payments are pretty straightforward: a customer enters a card number, submits payment, and the transaction is complete. However, B2B payments often involve additional requirements behind the scenes, including:
- Purchasing and corporate cards, which frequently require that merchants populate additional transaction data in their settlements to avoid interchange downgrades and higher processing costs. This includes tax amounts, purchase order numbers, customer codes, and line-item details such as SKUs, quantities, and unit prices.
- Split and partial shipments, where a single order may be authorized once but settled across multiple shipments as inventory becomes available.
- ACH and e-check payments, which many corporate buyers prefer or require for larger purchases.
- Multi-entity billing, where buyers may need to make purchases across multiple divisions or merchant accounts. Reporting needs to be simple, as does the user interface on the transaction processing side.
- PCI compliance considerations, especially when merchants store payment information internally and assume additional security and audit responsibilities. Tokenization, specifically, helps replace stored card numbers with non-sensitive tokens to reduce PCI compliance scope.
- ERP and order management integration, since payment workflows often need to connect directly to existing business systems rather than operate as a standalone checkout experience.
An Easier Approach to B2B E-Commerce Payments
As B2B purchasing continues to move online, payment systems play a larger role in both customer experience and operational efficiency. Merchants that understand the unique requirements of B2B transactions are better positioned to support their customers, simplify internal processes, and scale their online sales channels with confidence.
Curbstone’s payment solutions are designed to simplify B2B e-commerce payments, with full support for each of the most critical capabilities:
- Level 2, Level 3, and CEDP data capture and transmission
- ACH and e-check acceptance alongside credit card payments and alternative contactless payments
- Secure tokenization for stored payment credentials
- Flexible authorization and settlement workflows
- Native integration with IBM i-based ERP, accounting, and order management systems and support for non IBM-i web servers
For B2B merchants building a scalable, flexible e-commerce payment infrastructure, those capabilities can help create a more seamless experience for both customers and internal teams. To learn more about how these solutions can help you streamline operations, improve your customer and employee experience, and reduce the burden of PCI compliance, contact us today.
