ACH Bank Payment Billing for Agencies, Built on Plaid
ACH Bank-Link Payments via Plaid is part of HubWho. When you bill recurring clients on a credit card, you hand roughly 2.9% + $0.30 to the processor on every charge — and on high-ticket agency retainers that adds up fast. HubWho is built so clients can connect their business checking account once through Plaid bank-link, and every auto-draft after that runs over ACH instead of card. HubWho is pre-launch: it's being built with a small founding cohort of agencies through early access, so this page describes the ACH billing layer HubWho is designed to give those agencies, not a generally available service. It's written in the present tense to explain how the design works, but availability is early-access by request.
The problem: paying card fees on every recurring agency invoice
Most agencies bill recurring clients the easiest way they can set up quickly: a credit card on file. That's fine until you look at what it costs. Card processing runs about 2.9% + $0.30 per charge, so a single $2,000 monthly invoice loses roughly $58 to fees every time it drafts — and that repeats every month, on every client, for as long as the retainer runs.
For an agency with high-ticket recurring clients, those fees are not a rounding error. They're a recurring tax on revenue you've already earned. And the usual ACH alternative isn't much better: keying routing and account numbers into a payment gateway by hand, or waiting on micro-deposits to verify, is slow, error-prone, and not something most clients want to do over email.
So agencies stay on cards because cards are easy to collect, even though cards are the most expensive way to get paid. The cheaper rail — bank-to-bank ACH — usually loses on convenience, so it never gets set up.
- Card processing at roughly 2.9% + $0.30 quietly eats into margin on every recurring charge
- On a high-ticket retainer, those per-charge fees repeat every month for the life of the client
- Setting up ACH by hand means keying in routing and account numbers and hoping they're right
- Micro-deposit verification adds days of waiting before the first payment can run
- Clients resist any payment setup that's slow or feels like extra paperwork
- Without an easy bank-link option, agencies default to cards and keep paying the premium
How HubWho's ACH bank-link is designed to work
HubWho is being built so a client connects their bank account through a Plaid bank-link instead of typing in numbers. The client links their business checking account once, Plaid verifies it, and HubWho exchanges the Plaid token for a processor token so that verified account becomes a saved payment method on the client's record. The design avoids the micro-deposit wait, the PDF form to sign, and the manual keying of account details into a gateway.
Once a bank account is linked, HubWho's recurring billing is designed to auto-draft over ACH on the due date — the same scheduled, hands-off collection you'd expect from a card, just on the cheaper rail. Because the account is already verified and saved, each subsequent draft is meant to cost cents rather than a percentage of the invoice, which is where the savings compound for agencies with large recurring clients. ACH settles asynchronously, so a draft posts as pending and HubWho is built to reconcile it to paid when the provider's webhook confirms the transfer.
HubWho routes every payment path through one provider abstraction so an agency can choose its rail. Instant onboarding lets agencies start collecting before they're underwritten for their own merchant account. Agencies that prefer to run their own merchant account can connect Authorize.net for lower processing rates after underwriting. Both can be connected at once, and the point is one payment layer that offers a choice of rails instead of locking you onto cards.
- Plaid bank-link is designed to verify the client's account without a micro-deposit wait or manual routing-number entry
- The Plaid token is exchanged for a processor token, and the linked account becomes a saved payment method recurring billing can auto-draft over ACH
- ACH drafts post as pending and reconcile to paid when the provider's webhook confirms the transfer
- Instant onboarding is supported before you're underwritten for your own merchant account
- Authorize.net connects a dedicated merchant account for lower rates after underwriting; both providers can be connected and chosen per invoice
- Card and Apple Pay remain available alongside ACH for clients who prefer to pay that way
What's included
ACH bank-link is part of HubWho's core billing layer — the work the roadmap lists as building now — not a separate add-on. It's designed to tie into the same recurring subscriptions and invoicing the rest of HubWho is built around, so a linked bank account flows straight into auto-draft on each subscription's schedule rather than living in a separate tool.
Clients are meant to manage payment in the branded client portal: link a new bank account through Plaid or add a card, and mark the one they want used for autopay as the default — so the routine 'how do I update my payment method' email is designed to land in the portal instead of your inbox. The portal dashboard surfaces which method autopay will draft, showing the bank or card and its last four digits. The bank credentials themselves are stored encrypted, and the agency only ever sees the brand, bank name, and last four — never raw account numbers. The auto-draft itself is built with guardrails: at most one charge attempt per invoice per cycle through an idempotency key so a saved method isn't charged twice, plus a $10,000 per-charge sanity cap that skips anything larger for review.
Because HubWho is being built with a small founding cohort, the specific way your agency collects — which rail, which provider, how auto-draft fits your client terms — is something founding agencies help shape before public launch. Availability is by early-access request; the public contact is info@roffik.com.
- ACH bank-link sits inside the core billing layer the roadmap lists as building now, wired to recurring subscriptions and invoicing rather than a separate add-on
- Clients link a bank account via Plaid or add a card in the branded portal and mark one as the default used for autopay
- The portal dashboard shows which method autopay will draft, by bank or card brand and last four digits
- Bank credentials are stored encrypted; the agency only sees the brand, bank name, and last four, never raw account numbers
- Auto-draft fires at most one charge per invoice per cycle via an idempotency key, so a saved method isn't double-charged
- A $10,000 per-charge sanity cap skips anything larger and flags it for manual review
Frequently asked questions
How does a client connect their bank account for ACH?
HubWho is built so the client connects their business checking account once through a Plaid bank-link in the branded portal, instead of typing in routing and account numbers. Plaid verifies the account, HubWho exchanges the Plaid token for a processor token, and the verified account becomes a saved payment method — avoiding the micro-deposit wait. HubWho is pre-launch and this flow is being built for a founding cohort of agencies; availability is by early-access request at info@roffik.com.
Why pay over ACH instead of card?
Card processing runs about 2.9% + $0.30 per charge, so a $2,000 monthly invoice loses roughly $58 in fees every time it drafts. HubWho is designed so a linked bank account auto-drafts over ACH on the due date instead — once the account is verified and saved, each draft is meant to cost cents rather than a percentage of the invoice, which is where the savings compound on high-ticket recurring clients. Card and Apple Pay stay available for clients who prefer them.
Which payment providers does HubWho support for ACH?
HubWho routes every payment path through one provider abstraction so an agency can choose its rail. Instant onboarding lets agencies start collecting before they're underwritten for their own merchant account, and Authorize.net connects a dedicated merchant account for lower processing rates after underwriting. Both can be connected at once. These integrations are being built as part of HubWho's pre-launch core billing layer.