PayTo Agreement

What is a PayTo agreement?

A PayTo agreement is the digital equivalent of a signed direct debit authority, but it lives inside the customer’s banking app. It records who can pull payments, how much, and how often, and the customer approves, pauses, or cancels it themselves. For a business, the agreement is the standing permission that makes recurring collection possible. An Australian services firm collecting monthly fees would create a PayTo agreement for each customer rather than holding a stack of paper mandates.

Why it matters for Australian finance teams

The agreement is where trust is granted, so it is where fraud concentrates. Mandate fraud and impersonation aim to get an agreement approved against the wrong account or in the name of someone who did not consent. Because a single agreement can authorise many future payments, an error made at setup is repeated every billing cycle until someone notices. Getting the party and account right before the agreement is created matters far more than checking any individual payment afterward.

How ezyshield helps

ezyshield verifies the parties before a PayTo agreement is relied on. It confirms the person, validates the business through ABN and ASIC records, and checks that the nominated bank account is genuinely owned by them, so the standing authority rests on a verified identity. If the account or details later change, ezyshield triggers re-verification instead of trusting the amendment, and every check is written to an append-only audit trail that is logged and never edited or deleted. ezyshield verifies the parties; it does not create or hold the mandate itself. See how it works and PayTo fraud.