ACH (Automated Clearing House) is the network that moves money directly between bank accounts in the United States.
It’s become a key payment method in the US, especially for businesses processing subscriptions, ecommerce purchases, and larger transactions, giving customers a strong alternative to credit cards.
But how do you actually start accepting ACH payments? In this guide, we’ll walk you through the steps involved.
Ready to add ACH payments without the engineering overhead? Book a call with Primer to learn more.
How ACH payments work
ACH payments move money electronically between bank accounts through the Automated Clearing House (ACH) network, a payment system used by banks and financial institutions across the United States.
There are two types of ACH payments:
- ACH debit: A business pulls funds from a customer’s bank account after the customer authorizes the payment. This is the model most commonly used for subscriptions, invoices, and ecommerce payments.
- ACH credit: A business pushes funds to another bank account. This is typically used for direct deposits, payroll, or refunds.
Most merchants accepting ACH payments are using ACH debit, where customers authorize payments directly from their bank account.
When a customer pays with ACH debit, they authorize a business to debit their checking account. The business collects the customer’s banking information, including their account number and routing number, and submits the payment through its payment provider.
From there, the transaction flows through the ACH network:
- The payment request is sent by the business’s bank, known as the Originating Depository Financial Institution (ODFI).
- The ACH network processes the transaction and sends it to the customer’s bank, called the Receiving Depository Financial Institution (RDFI).
- The customer’s bank verifies the account information and transfers the payment amount from the customer’s bank account to the business’s bank account.
Most ACH transfers settle within one to three business days, though same-day ACH can speed up the process for eligible payments.
Because ACH is an electronic funds transfer (EFT) system, it offers a cost-effective alternative to credit card processing and replaces slower payment methods like manual bank transfers.
Why US businesses are offering ACH payments
- ACH is popular with consumers: Recently, ACH Network payment volume rose to 35.2 billion payments in 2025, that's 141 million transactions per day.
- Lower fees than cards: ACH transactions typically cost $0.20–$1.50 per transaction, compared to 2–3% for credit cards.
- Lower decline rates: Since funds are pulled directly from bank accounts, ACH tends to have fewer authorization failures compared to cards, which can be declined for various reasons, including card limits, expired cards, or fraud flags.
- Perfect for recurring revenue: ACH debit enables merchants to pull funds from customers' accounts through recurring subscriptions or invoices. This means merchants don’t have to ask customers to re-enter details or worry about expired cards.
How to accept ACH payments
Step 1: Choose a PSP that supports ACH
Not all payment service providers support ACH processing. Popular US options include Stripe or Braintree. Each has different API structures, pricing models, and settlement timelines.
You can also work with ACH-focused providers like Dwolla, which specializes in bank-to-bank payment infrastructure and direct ACH integrations.
Step 2: Complete onboarding and compliance
Before processing your first ACH payment, you'll go through two layers of requirements:
- The first is standard PSP onboarding. This involves setting up a merchant account and completing KYC verification with your chosen provider.
- The second is ACH-specific compliance. You need to agree to NACHA (National Automated Clearing House Association) operating rules and implement authorization flows that ensure customers explicitly authorize ACH debits.
Step 3: Build the integration, and maintain it
For a direct integration with a PSP, you’ll need to assign significant engineering resources as integration typically takes four to eight weeks.
Your development team will need to:
- Integrate the PSP's API or SDK
- Build checkout flows to collect bank account details
- Implement account verification using either micro-deposit verification or instant verification
- Handle webhook events for payment status
- Build retry logic for failed transactions
- Set up reconciliation to match settlements with internal records
From there, ongoing maintenance includes:
- Monitoring failed payments
- Handling dozens of possible return codes
- Updating integrations when PSPs change APIs
- Managing compliance with NACHA rule updates
How to accept ACH payments in minutes with Primer
Primer is a unified payments infrastructure platform that eliminates the engineering effort required to add new payment methods like ACH, taking the integration from months to minutes. With a single API connection, businesses can instantly activate new processors and enable new payment methods.
Here’s how it works with Primer:
Step 1: Connect an ACH-enabled processor and activate ACH
First, connect a payment processor that supports ACH (such as Stripe) in the Integrations section of the Primer Dashboard. When connecting the processor, you select the payment methods you want to enable, including ACH.
Step 2: Add ACH to your Checkout
Once the processor is connected, go to the Checkout section of the Dashboard and activate ACH as a payment method. From there, you can configure how and when the payment method appears to customers.
For example, you can:
- Control when ACH appears (based on amount, currency, or location)
- Reorder payment methods
- Decide which processors handle ACH payments
Step 3: Configure payment workflows
Next, configure a Workflow that defines how ACH payments are processed.
For example, you can create a workflow that:
- Authorizes ACH payments through your connected processor
- Routes payments based on rules like transaction size
- Adds retry logic or fallback options if a payment fails
Step 4: Start accepting ACH payments
Once the processor connection, checkout configuration, and workflow are live, ACH becomes available to customers during checkout.
Why merchants are using Primer
Adding new payment methods like ACH is just one part of what Primer does. Primer is designed to help merchants manage the entire payment flow across their business, from how payments are accepted and routed to how they’re analyzed and reconciled.
1. View all your payment data in one place with Observability Dashboard
Primer Observability brings together payment data from all your processors and payment methods in one place.
Instead of logging into multiple PSP dashboards, you can track performance across your entire payment stack through a unified view. With rich visualizations and flexible filters, you can analyze payment data by processor, payment method, region, customer segment, or transaction size.
This makes it easier to identify issues quickly and measure the impact of changes to your payment strategy.
2. Build and optimize payment flows without engineering resources
With Workflows, payments teams can design and optimize payment routing without writing code.
Using a drag-and-drop interface, you can create custom payment journeys that route transactions to different processors based on rules like transaction size, geography, or payment method.
Because these flows can be updated instantly, payment teams can experiment and optimize performance without waiting for engineering.
3. Reconcile payments from a single source of truth
Primer Reconciliation brings payment and settlement data from all processors into one standardized format. This lets finance teams automatically match transactions, uncover fees or discrepancies, and reduce reliance on manual downloads and spreadsheets.
The result is faster month-end closes, clearer financial visibility, and far less reconciliation work for finance teams.
4. Reduce cross-border fees with Global Accounts
Primer’s Global Accounts feature allows you to manage accounts in 20+ countries and currencies from a single platform. You can receive, hold, and convert funds between currencies without needing separate banking infrastructure.
This helps reduce costly forced currency conversions, lowers PSP fees, and simplifies reconciliation across multiple processors and currencies.
If you're expanding beyond the US and want to accept local payment methods alongside ACH, Global Accounts provides the infrastructure to manage global payments and currency conversion without setting up separate treasury systems.
Accept ACH payments without the engineering overhead with Primer
Adding ACH shouldn't require months of engineering work or compromise your ability to optimize payments. With Primer, you get the flexibility to add ACH in minutes, the control to route intelligently, and the visibility to continuously improve performance.
Book a demo to discover how Primer's unified payment infrastructure can help you expand payment options, reduce costs, and scale faster.
Frequently asked questions (FAQ)
How much does it cost to accept ACH payments?
ACH payment fees are significantly lower than credit card fees. ACH transactions typically cost between $0.20 and $1.50 per transaction, compared to 1-3% fees for credit card transactions.
Because ACH payments move money directly between bank accounts through the Automated Clearing House network, they are often a more cost-effective option for businesses processing larger online payments or recurring billing.
The exact processing fees depend on your payment service provider and transaction volume. Some providers charge a flat fee per payment, while others use a combination of flat and percentage pricing.
Can I accept ACH payments alongside credit cards and other payment methods?
Yes. Offering multiple online payment options typically improves the customer experience, since customers have different preferences.
Some customers prefer ACH or bank transfers that debit their checking account, while others want the speed of credit card transactions.
With Primer's unified payment infrastructure, you can activate ACH payment processing alongside cards, digital wallets, and other payment methods from a single integration.
What happens if an ACH payment fails?
ACH payments can fail for several reasons, including insufficient funds, closed accounts, incorrect banking information, or revoked authorization to debit the customer’s bank account.
When a payment fails, the ACH payment system returns a code explaining why the ACH transfer was rejected. Some return codes allow retries (such as insufficient funds), while others do not (such as a closed account).
With Primer, you can automate the recovery process by retrying eligible payments or routing the transaction to an alternative payment method.
Do I need to be PCI compliant to accept ACH payments?
If you store sensitive account information like a customer's account number and routing number yourself, you need to implement strong security controls and may need to pursue PCI DSS compliance.
Many businesses avoid this complexity by using payment infrastructure that securely stores bank account information on their behalf.
When you use Primer's infrastructure, payment credentials can be securely stored and managed without requiring merchants to build their own secure storage systems, reducing operational complexity and risk.
How long do ACH payments take to process?
ACH payments typically take one to three business days to settle, though same-day ACH is available for certain transactions.
Because ACH payments move funds between financial institutions through the Automated Clearing House network, they can take longer than card payments to clear.
However, ACH transfers are often preferred for recurring payments, subscriptions, and larger transactions because they are more cost-effective than credit card processing.
