• Khalil Kammoun, Vice-President of Product and Technology at Worldline


• 29.10.2025 03:30 pm
#payments #AI

The digital payments sector is growing at an unprecedented pace, with forecasts estimating it will reach £16 trillion by the end of 2025. But even in such a booming market, merchants continue to face familiar hurdles: navigating complex payment networks, keeping processing costs under control, and ensuring seamless payment approvals for customers.

Traditional payment routing often fails to address these challenges, leading to higher fees, unnecessary declines, and lost sales. And with millions of transactions processed every day, even small inefficiencies can quickly add up to significant revenue leakage.

This is where Smart Routing, powered by artificial intelligence (AI), is reshaping the payments landscape. By dynamically directing each transaction through the most efficient route, merchants can boost approval rates, reduce costs, and secure long-term profitability.

Cutting Through Complexity

Managing payments is rarely straightforward. Multiple acquirers, fluctuating fees, regional approval rates, and shifting regulations turn optimisation into a constant challenge. Smart Routing cuts through this complexity, automatically directing each transaction to the acquirer most likely to deliver the best outcome.

What makes it so effective is its adaptability. Merchants can define their own routing rules—whether they want to minimise costs, maximise approvals, or balance transaction volumes across providers. Once priorities are set, the system works in real time, analysing transaction details and selecting the optimal route for every payment.

Key Routing Capabilities

Smart Routing gives merchants three core levers of control:

• Cost Optimisation: Transactions flow to the acquirer offering the lowest fees, directly protecting margins.

• Approval Maximisation: The system identifies which acquirer is most likely to approve a transaction, reducing declines and improving customer experience.

• Volume Distribution: Payments can be distributed across acquirers based on business strategy, helping to spread risk and maintain strong provider relationships.

Because rules can be fine-tuned by industry, geography, or sales channel, Smart Routing adapts to the way each business operates.

The AI Advantage

Artificial intelligence takes Smart Routing further. Instead of relying solely on static rules, AI analyses vast amounts of transaction data to identify patterns and predict the route most likely to succeed.

The system continually learns—tracking approval rates, monitoring acquirer performance, and recognising emerging trends. Over time, its predictions become sharper, ensuring more transactions are approved with fewer delays.

Importantly, AI enhances rather than replaces merchant control. Merchants set the objectives; AI simply delivers them with greater speed and accuracy than manual processes ever could.

Decisions in Real Time

AI-powered routing draws on a wide range of factors in milliseconds, including:

• Transaction amount and currency

• Customer location and payment method

• Historical approval rates

• Current acquirer performance

• Local compliance requirements

• Seasonal or event-driven behaviours

For customers, the result is simple: secure, seamless payments with no added friction.

Measurable Gains

The impact is clear. Merchants using rule-based Smart Routing typically see approval rates rise by up to 3%. With AI layered on top, rates can climb by an additional 2%. At scale, these small percentages translate into meaningful revenue growth.

Other everyday benefits include:

• Omnichannel Integration: Streamlines online and in-store transactions.

• Business Continuity: Automatically reroutes payments if one acquirer fails.

• Cost Control: Consistently directs transactions to the lowest-cost option.

• Seamless Implementation: Designed to integrate with existing systems, requiring minimal IT effort.

Across thousands or millions of payments, the gains compound. Lower fees preserve margins, higher approval rates reduce churn, and the system scales effortlessly as businesses grow.

Strategic Insights

Beyond efficiency, Smart Routing generates valuable intelligence. Transaction data reveals which acquirers perform best, how different markets behave, and where processes can be fine-tuned. These insights inform stronger long-term strategies, turning payments into a lever for competitive advantage.

The payments ecosystem is constantly evolving. Regulations shift, customer behaviours change, and new providers enter the market. With AI continuously learning and adapting, Smart Routing gives merchants the agility to stay ahead, avoiding lock-in to a single acquirer or outdated process.

From Optimisation to Advantage

Getting started is simple: merchants define their priorities, cutting costs, raising approval rates, or balancing both and map existing acquirer relationships. From there, AI refines routing strategies over time, with results often visible within weeks.

In today’s competitive landscape, payments are no longer just a back-office function. With AI-powered Smart Routing, they become a driver of growth, resilience, and customer loyalty. By lowering costs, improving approvals, and enabling agility, Smart Routing transforms payments from a source of friction into a strategic advantage.