Monday Interview: James Howard, founder and MD of Yorkshire Payments

A commitment to building up trade in Yorkshire first before chasing contracts further afield has paid dividends for pay-tech firm Yorkshire Payments, according to its managing director.

James Howard said the company’s cultivation of its brand within the county has ensured it has become recognised and trusted.

He added: “This has led to a significant amount of business growth coming through word of mouth referrals, which complements the work of our dedicated business development team covering Yorkshire.

“We’ve reached a stage where we’re organically expanding into other areas of the UK due to our reputation across Yorkshire, and have launched a dedicated sports payments brand, Yorkshire Sports Pay, that’ll see us working with sports venues up and down the country.”

Launched by Howard in 2013, the company now has over 3,500 clients across Yorkshire and employs 36 people at its head office in Brighouse. In July, the company invested a six-figure sum to relocate its head office to the centre of Brighouse, increasing space from 900 sq ft to over 6,000 sq ft.

In the last 12 months, Yorkshire Payments has welcomed attractions and sports clubs to its client roster, including Cannon Hall Farm, The Piece Hall, Bradford City Football Club, Huddersfield Town Football Club and Scarborough Cricket Club.

Howard started his career in sales at Phones4U. He moved to BSkyB where he worked in field sales to the hospitality industry, before moving into merchant services and establishing Yorkshire Payments.

His company is best known for its card payment terminals and it provides local, national and international businesses with fixed and portable contactless terminals so they can benefit from the ever-growing demand for paying by card.

But Yorkshire Payments also specialises in Electronic Point of Sale, or ‘EPOS’ systems, which give clients insights into key performance data such as stock levels and staff productivity to help them make more informed commercial decisions.

And it works with charities across Yorkshire to help them benefit from fixed and portable, contactless donation points that can be used at fundraising events.

Howard explained: “I initially established Yorkshire Payments to provide cost-effective merchant services for small businesses so they could afford to process card payments without falling foul of the charges associated with the high street banks.

“I recognised the need for a more personal, localised approach to customer service. If you’re a small shop, café or bar, you don’t want to waste time contacting call centres abroad every time your card machine goes down. You want fast, friendly and reliable service that will get the problem sorted asap.

“As the business has grown, we’ve attracted more well-known, bigger names, including Harrogate Spring water, Snickers Workwear and international white goods manufacturer, White Knight.

“However, we’ll always continue to champion the thousands of small and micro businesses across Yorkshire that use our solutions, and our localised approach to customer service will continue to be delivered from our head office in Brighouse town centre.”

He said relocating the company’s head office was a key move to prepare for its next phase of growth that will see it work towards doubling turnover to £4m by 2021.

“It has given us more room to improve the service we provide, and allowed us to enhance our business development process by opening a showroom that features a working bar so we can demonstrate our solutions in a real life environment,” he said.

“We also have the space to grow our staff numbers significantly over the next few years.

“Over the next 18 months we’ll be focusing on developing our sports payments arm, Yorkshire Sports Pay, across the UK. In addition, there’ll be a focus on working more closely with the fantastic charities we have across Yorkshire to help them benefit from contactless card donations to maximise their fundraising.”

Howard said that as the number of people using cash continues to decline, his business will be operating in a market that is full of opportunity. However, he noted: “It’s very competitive at the same time, and we’ll always compete with internationally known bank and merchant service brands.

“Many businesses must be worked hard to be convinced to move away from globally recognised brands to work with a smaller, yet more cost effective supplier. But this is a challenge we continue to overcome by placing our key values of honesty, integrity and localised customer service at the heart of what we do.”