We’re enhancing your Payee Positive Pay service on June 1, 2024.

Below is everything you need to know to prepare your organization and employees responsible for interfacing with Positive Pay within Synovus Gateway digital commercial banking. We recommend reviewing the resources below and applying best practices as soon as possible to prepare, particularly if your organization currently experiences a high volume of Positive Pay exception items. Conversely, if you experience very few  exception items, or no exceptions, we strongly encourage you to still follow the below outlined guidelines.

What you can expect

Your organization could potentially experience an increase in daily Positive Pay exceptions as a result of this enhancement. However, you can greatly reduce or eliminate the number of exceptions, as well as avoid the associated per item fee, by ensuring you have industry best practices in place ahead of this change.

How to prepare now: Make sure you have industry best practices in place

• Review our revised Payee Match Guidelines & Best Practices and File Mapping Requirements.


• Ensure an exact payee name match. In each check issue file you submit, always enter the full payee name for each check, and ensure the name is an exact match to each respective check. The file must match the check exactly to avoid an exception.


• Establish a set time to review and decision Positive Pay exceptions daily – Establish a set time between 10am – 2pm ET to review and process your organization’s Positive Pay exception items daily. For added convenience, you may also decision Positive Pay exceptions within the Synovus Gateway Mobile1 App.


• Designate additional Positive Pay approvers – We strongly recommend that your organization designate additional Positive Pay approvers to decision exception items in the absence of the primary approver. This is not only important to ensure coverage during spring and summer vacation seasons, but also throughout the year to ensure you have personnel in place to decision your exception items. Gateway administrators have the ability to set up additional users/approvers for this purpose. For user setup instructions, see the Synovus Gateway User Management Guide for instructions.


• Set up Positive Pay alerts – Setting up notifications and alerts (email and text) within Gateway are helpful reminders to decision your Positive Pay exceptions. Synovus Gateway allows you to establish preauthorized rules for ACH credits and debits, as well as set default settings for checks. Note: We do not provide email or phone call reminders to decision your company’s Positive Pay items as automated notifications and alerts may be established within Synovus Gateway. We strongly recommend that you set up Positive Pay alerts to receive reminders and notifications to decision items. Also, if you use Check Positive Pay, be sure to set up or confirm your default setting. To set up Positive Pay alerts and notifications, see the Positive Pay video tutorial and the Positive Pay User Guide.

Note: All references linked above are permanently housed on the Gateway Commercial Resources page for ongoing reference. You may also access the Resources page via the Help function within the Synovus Gateway application Note: File Mapping Requirements are found within the Appendix of the Positive Pay User Guide.

Have questions or need more information?

If you’ve reviewed resources and still have questions about this fraud mitigation enhancement or how to prepare, we can help. Contact your Relationship Manager, Treasury Management Consultant, or call Synovus Customer Care at 888-SYNOVUS (796-6887).