Michael Meeks, CTO For decades, the payments back office was designed to be invisible. Its role was to process enormous volumes of transaction data accurately, overnight, and at the lowest possible cost. As long as files balanced and funds settled, success was measured quietly and behind the scenes.
That model no longer fits today’s payments landscape.
As payment volumes surge, margins tighten, and real-time payment methods proliferate, financial institutions and payment processors are discovering that the back office is no longer just operational infrastructure; it is a strategic platform. The ability to capture, process, and expose transaction lifecycle data in real time is becoming a key driver of client experience, operational efficiency, and competitive differentiation.
This is where BHMI has focused its expertise.
A Purpose-Built Focus on Payments After Authorization
Founded in 1986, BHMI made a strategic decision in 2020 to specialize in post-authorization processing. This is the complex world of reconciliation, settlement, fee calculation, disputes, and exception management. While many technology providers focused on transaction initiation and authorization, BHMI concentrated on what happens next: ensuring that every transaction is accurately accounted for, monetized, resolved, and settled.
That focus led to the creation of the Concourse Financial Software Suite, a modular back-office platform designed specifically for high-volume, highly complex payment processing environments. Concourse supports card-based and real-time payment methods within a single architecture, enabling organizations to modernize legacy operations without fragmenting their payments ecosystem.
Continuous Processing for a 24x7x365 Payments World
One of the most significant shifts in payments operations is the move from batch-based processing to continuous, always-on environments. Real-time payment rails and instant settlement expectations leave no room for overnight reconciliation windows or delayed exception handling.
Concourse is built to operate differently. The moment a transaction is authorized, it immediately moves through Concourse’s continuous processing architecture. As a result, functions such as reconciliation, fee assessment, exception detection, and settlement happen as transactions flow into the system, not hours later.
For banks and processors, this translates into faster settlement cycles, improved financial visibility, and reduced operational risk. For their clients, it means fewer surprises, clearer reporting, and greater confidence in the accuracy of their financial data.
Turning Transaction Data into Client Intelligence
Modern payment clients expect more than confirmation that funds have moved. They want visibility into the full transaction lifecycle including what happened, why it happened, and what to do next.
Back-office systems hold the richest source of this intelligence, but only if the data is structured, accessible, and actionable.
Concourse aggregates transaction data across sources and creates a unified view that spans authorization, reconciliation, fees, disputes, and settlement. A powerful rules engine allows organizations to configure workflows, calculations, and exception handling without custom development, adapting quickly as payment methods and business models evolve.
This foundation enables financial services companies to provide clients with access to real-time data, detailed search and query capabilities, and transparent reporting. Instead of relying on support tickets and delayed investigations, clients gain self-service insight into their payment activity, strengthening trust and reducing operational friction.
Simplifying Complexity as Payment Methods Multiply
The payments ecosystem is expanding rapidly. Card networks, real-time payment schemes, digital wallets, and emerging rails each introduce unique data structures, settlement models, and compliance requirements. Managing this diversity with siloed systems increases cost and operational inefficiency.
Concourse addresses this challenge by normalizing transaction processing across payment types while preserving the unique attributes of each method. This unified approach reduces complexity, accelerates onboarding of new payment rails, and allows organizations to expand acceptance without rebuilding their back office for every innovation.
At the same time, support for modern data standards such as ISO 20022 enables richer remittance information, improved reconciliation, and greater automation. These capabilities are becoming essential as transaction volumes and client expectations grow.
Operational Efficiency That Scales with the Business
Beyond client-facing benefits, back-office modernization delivers measurable internal value. Automated reconciliation reduces manual effort and error rates. Integrated dispute and chargeback workflows streamline resolution and improve recovery. Real-time exception detection enables faster response before issues escalate.
For payment providers, these efficiencies directly impact profitability. Concourse helps organizations meet service-level commitments, manage growth without proportional increases in staffing, and adapt quickly to regulatory or network changes.
Just as importantly, the platform’s flexibility allows organizations to configure fee models, monetize value-added services, and introduce new revenue streams tied directly to transaction activity.
The Back Office as a Strategic Asset
The role of the payments back office has changed. It is no longer a hidden utility. It is the control center that powers transparency, insight, and trust across the payment lifecycle.
By investing in modern, continuously available back-office platforms, banks and payment processors can transform payments from a cost center into a strategic asset. They gain the ability to serve clients proactively, operate with confidence in real time, and compete effectively in a rapidly evolving ecosystem.
For BHMI, this has been the mission from the beginning: to deliver enterprise-grade software that enables organizations to modernize payments operations, unlock the value of their data, and build loyal client relationships. As payments continue to evolve, the back office will remain where real differentiation begins.
About BHMI & Concourse
BHMI is a global provider of enterprise software for the payments industry, specializing in post-authorization and back-office transaction processing. Best known as the creator of the
Concourse Financial Software Suite, BHMI delivers a continuously available, highly scalable platform that supports reconciliation, settlement, fee processing, and dispute management across card-based and real-time payment methods. The solution enables banks, processors, and payment service providers to modernize legacy back-office systems, improve operational efficiency, and transform payments data into actionable insights. With a focus on reliability, configurability, and long-term partnership, BHMI helps clients turn the payments back office into a strategic platform for growth, transparency, and trust.
