Having trouble with the site eRentpayment
Philadelphia, PA · Member since 2016 · 54 posts · 30 votes
Disclosure - I am the Founder/CEO at Cozy
This has been a tough few days for many landlords, and we understand your fears, concerns, and frustrations. Thank you to those of you asking about our methods. Let me share why we believe landlords and renters using Cozy will not experience a similar result to the recent event.
First, and perhaps most importantly, we work with Stripe for payment processing. Stripe operates in 25 countries, and they’re a company clearly set up for the long term. Stripe is a $9 Billion company and is widely regarded as a trusted payment processor. Stripe handles payments for tons of awesome companies, including, coincidentally, BiggerPockets.
While we have many internal safeguards that I’ll talk about in a second, understand that Cozy never takes custody of your funds during a payment transaction. Our processing partner Stripe is a licensed money transmitter, and moves your money on our behalf. Funds travel from renters’ bank accounts and credit cards and are deposited in landlords’ bank accounts via the ACH system. Cozy has no access to your money while it’s in transit.
eRentPayment in a recent statement said the following:
“We regret to inform you that our payment processor, eCheckit, has informed us that it expects to file for bankruptcy protection shortly. We are told that it suffered losses due to a fraud and that its processor, Check Commerce, has held over $4 million of its funds and will not release the funds to the intended recipients at this time.”
We believe it to be extremely unlikely that Stripe will experience an issue like this. Their underpinnings are built with Wells Fargo, which is the fourth largest bank in the United States.
Of course, this is not the only issue that may affect your security when processing rent payments, so we have additional buffers in place to add additional security:
1) Our Trust & Safety team ensures that every single Cozy payment goes through several layers of fraud detection. These include internal proprietary software, external partners such as Sift Science, and humans at Cozy.
2) We employ a rigorous software development process. Every code change is backed with automated tests and reviewed by at least two engineers. Cozy has to work reliably. We understand how costly bugs can be, like when Knight Capital lost $441 million in 45 minutes.
3) We keep our infrastructure up to date, which ensures that we receive security updates as soon as possible. The recent Equifax breach was a result of a security update that took months to apply. Similar updates to Cozy’s environment are applied in days, or even the same day, for critical vulnerabilities.
4) We actively and voluntarily pursue data security. Cozy is voluntarily compliant with PCI DSS, even though we do not store your credit card information. (It’s in Stripe, so why also store it on Cozy?) PCI DSS is one of the most stringent organizational security standards in financial technology. We hire third-party security specialists to perform yearly audits. For example, the leak of credit card information at Home Depot in 2014 was due to insufficient PCI DSS compliance.
@Rick S. the Facebook update this morning was clear as mud. And it's now the 17th. To stop all of us thinking the worst (that you are running off to Mexico with our money) and to stop us from dropping you in advance of Nov 1st, you need to tell us who the all the banks are, which bank is causing the problem (old bank, new bank, newer bank, WITH VERIFIABLE CONTACTS), how many people out of how many are effected and why, who your lawyers are that working on this...at this point we need to be getting this verified by the banks and/or your lawyers! If I saw on the banks and/or lawyers webpages updates about this, or could talk to the lawyer or bank at a phone number I could verify, I for one would feel a lot better!!!
Wow...just signed up with them in anticipation of using them when I fill my 2 current vacancies.....I had looked at Cozy also, but it looked very basic for customized options and accepts partial rent payments, which I don't like at all....
I'm having issues too. I have payments made on the 5th of October which still haven't reached my account. Despite the fact that the fee came out on the 12th and erentpayment transaction history is saying my money was deposited on the 13th. HOWEVER NO DEPOSITS IN MY BANK, only fee withdrawals. I don't use my rental income on a daily basis so I only noticed today oct 18th when I went to transfer money to buy another property. NONE of my October rent was deposited in my account almost two weeks later. Which is absolutely crazy!!.
I too am very disappointed in the lack of communication by them. I've been a loyal customer from the very beginning. Back in the day c. 2011 They used to send out auto-emails when a public holiday was going to interrupt processing and now they can't send out an email when something as significant as this is going on.
I sent them an email asking what was going on but came on to here to see if anyone else having same issues.
I too have now experienced what is looking like a loss using eRentPayment. I have contacted erentpayment about a transfer that shows (processed) but I did not receive the funds. Another transaction still shows "pending" after 8 days. They did not return my emails, and when I called I got a message stating they do not accept phone call, but suggested I email them.
To make long story shorter, I contacted the BBB, the could only say they were updating their info on this company. I contact my state atty gen. office, who told me they had not received any info from other states about an investigation into eRentPayment.com. They did give me the state or origin for eRentPayment, Colorado.
I contacted the atty. gen. office in Colorado and explained my situation and suspicion. They promptly returned my call and requested I file a report with the FBI IC3 (internet crime complaint center) https://complaint.ic3.gov/default.aspx?#. They also requested I file a report with their office, https://www.stopfraudcolorado.gov/. I have since done this and advised my tenants not to use erentpayment any longer.
Here is the message I received - very disappointing.
e regret to inform you that our payment processor, eCheckit, has informed us that it expects to file for bankruptcy protection shortly. We are told that it suffered losses due to a fraud and that its processor, Check Commerce, has held over $4 million of it's funds and will not release the funds to the intended recipients at this time. Please note that eRentPayment had nothing to due with the fraud eCheckit suffered. It was apparently caused by another client of eCheckit.
The transactions potentially affected were submitted after approximately 7:31:00 PM (Pacific time) on 10/03/2017 through approximately 7:01:33 PM (Pacific time) on 10/12/2017. Any transactions submitted after this time period should not be affected as they are being processed through eRentPayment’s new direct bank relationship. Similarly, any future transactions should not be affected as they will be run through the new direct processing relationship.
We do not know if or when Check Commerce will send the pending transactions to the recipients. Accordingly, you should consider your options including having the tenant contact his or her bank to request the transaction be reversed. Specifically, the tenant may initiate a return for an ”Incomplete Transaction.” We understand that the return code for this is “R10” and the bank will require a written statement from the tenant. Also, the tenant will have a limited time period to request the return from his bank, usually within 60 days from the date of the transaction.
We are contacting the Attorney General of Arizona, NACHA, and reviewing legal action against the relevant parties.
When we have more information, we will let you know.
@Jerry O. i joined the FB group for a complete update and its been very informative. you arent alone. last i checked it was almost 50 ppl who had documented their contact info and what was owed and over 200 ppl in the group.
eRentPayment Discussion GroupI suggest that everyone affected call the FBI internet crimes division in Denver. Google the number. Seems to me that if these guys were truthful we would have known these details long ago when they kept using the excuse of changing banks. They are just as complicit in this as "echeckit".
I have just messaged all my tenants to cancel their accounts and not pay November's rent. it's not the mistake, it's the way eRentPayment.com has handled it. Completely absolving themselves of responsibility...very casual, "too bad so sad" sort of attitude, like these things "just happen."
Just just to play Devil's Advocate, I have been using erentpayment.com for close to three years now and I just double-checked and all of my October transactions arrived in my account on the 5th just as they always do.
Good luck to everyone! I hope everything shakes out! Just wanted to share that I've had nothing but great service from them thus far.
I've been having the same issue. I've made 2 attempts to address a problem with receiving my payment with erentpayment.com. The transaction says that it was scheduled 10/5/17 and deposited 10/13/17. It's 10/19/17 and I have not received that payment and I have been charged $3 for the transaction. They're not taking any calls and no one has responded to any of my emails or the "tickets" that I've submitted.
Disclosure - I am the Founder/CEO at Cozy
This has been a tough few days for many landlords, and we understand your fears, concerns, and frustrations. Thank you to those of you asking about our methods. Let me share why we believe landlords and renters using Cozy will not experience a similar result to the recent event.
First, and perhaps most importantly, we work with Stripe for payment processing. Stripe operates in 25 countries, and they’re a company clearly set up for the long term. Stripe is a $9 Billion company and is widely regarded as a trusted payment processor. Stripe handles payments for tons of awesome companies, including, coincidentally, BiggerPockets.
While we have many internal safeguards that I’ll talk about in a second, understand that Cozy never takes custody of your funds during a payment transaction. Our processing partner Stripe is a licensed money transmitter, and moves your money on our behalf. Funds travel from renters’ bank accounts and credit cards and are deposited in landlords’ bank accounts via the ACH system. Cozy has no access to your money while it’s in transit.
eRentPayment in a recent statement said the following:
“We regret to inform you that our payment processor, eCheckit, has informed us that it expects to file for bankruptcy protection shortly. We are told that it suffered losses due to a fraud and that its processor, Check Commerce, has held over $4 million of its funds and will not release the funds to the intended recipients at this time.”
We believe it to be extremely unlikely that Stripe will experience an issue like this. Their underpinnings are built with Wells Fargo, which is the fourth largest bank in the United States.
Of course, this is not the only issue that may affect your security when processing rent payments, so we have additional buffers in place to add additional security:
1) Our Trust & Safety team ensures that every single Cozy payment goes through several layers of fraud detection. These include internal proprietary software, external partners such as Sift Science, and humans at Cozy.
2) We employ a rigorous software development process. Every code change is backed with automated tests and reviewed by at least two engineers. Cozy has to work reliably. We understand how costly bugs can be, like when Knight Capital lost $441 million in 45 minutes.
3) We keep our infrastructure up to date, which ensures that we receive security updates as soon as possible. The recent Equifax breach was a result of a security update that took months to apply. Similar updates to Cozy’s environment are applied in days, or even the same day, for critical vulnerabilities.
4) We actively and voluntarily pursue data security. Cozy is voluntarily compliant with PCI DSS, even though we do not store your credit card information. (It’s in Stripe, so why also store it on Cozy?) PCI DSS is one of the most stringent organizational security standards in financial technology. We hire third-party security specialists to perform yearly audits. For example, the leak of credit card information at Home Depot in 2014 was due to insufficient PCI DSS compliance.
@Daniel Paloscio sadly they are only updating their facebook page :/ basically claimed to be at bankruptcy at play ... funds frozen
Go to Facebook and look for ERentPayment Discussion Group. You must request to be a part of the group. Here is the update.
“Hello Everyone, I found out what entities are involved in this situation through my bank. I will list contact information for all entities at the end of this very lengthy post. Nevertheless, my understanding is that the company that is holding our money is an ACH processing company by the name of Check Commerce. However, when calling Check Commerce they will not answer any questions and automatically refer me to a lady named Jessica Benzaken. Jessica is the Operations Manager for a company named E-checkit. E-checkit is a reseller of Check Commerce's services. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get Jessica on the phone nor was I able to reach anyone by calling E-checkit's main business#. The other entity involved in this issue is Premier Banking. They, however, assured me that they aren't holding our funds. It is unlawful for banks to just hold on to funds associated with an ACH transaction past a certain period of time. As mentioned before, Check Commerce wouldn't answer any of my questions regarding erentpayment, so I called their Sales Dept, posing as if I wanted to procure their services. I specifically asked questions surrounding "reserve accounts". The Sales Rep basically told me that they don't require reserve accounts. He said that when you start the service, underwriting does ask you to provide proof that you have a certain amount of money in your company's operating account. However, the amount required is based on the dollar amount you're going to process in ACH transactions through Check Commerce's service each month. Neverthless, one's operating account isn't something that is monitored after they sign you on as a client. It is only a requirement for underwriting. The Sales Rep went on to explain that they would only suspend one's Check Commerce account and freeze the assets, if the client fails to pay their monthly fees to Check Commerce. It is my "hunch" that this is probably what has happened with our money, and that Rick Sands isn't being honest. With this said, I think our next steps should be as follows:
1. Create a spreadsheet with everyone's name, phone#, email address, and amount being held and post it on Google Drive or somewhere where everyone can pull the spreadsheet to enter their info. If somebody has a better idea as opposed to collecting the info via a spreadsheet, please chime in.
2. Create a Facebook group page (private) to post on versus using chat. We can also upload docs and other info to that page as well
3. Hold a conference call to share ideas on how to organize our campaign in preparation for taking legal action
4. Compile a list of all the websites, social media pages, etc. that we want to post our story on or file complaints on
5. Implement our plan and get our money!
Here are the names/contact info of each entity involved. We need to flood their phone lines, Facebook pages, social media profiles, etc with our grievances!
1. First Premier Bank (not holding the money to my knowledge but has some sort of relationship with Erentpayment and Check Commerce because their information was on one of my previous deposits from Erentpayment)
Contact - Jessica Perkins *spoke to her but she wouldn't give any info of course. Just took down my name/number to give to Rick Sands)
2. Check Commerce - ACH Processor
Erentpayment's Client ID# 0000121487
CC Operations D/B/A E-Checkit - ACH Processor's reseller
Jessica Benzaken, Operations Mgr.
Chris McCarty, President
Erent Payment
Owner, Rick Sands
@Gino Zahnd i second what patrick said. My concern is that you still have a middleman. Stripe... I realize it's unlikely that a multibillion dollar company like stripe wld just go bankrupt but I'd love to know if that were to happen wld there be any difference b/w what we wld experience with cozy and what we are experiencing with erentpayment. I'm honestly scared of the middle man component. I loved using erentpayment for the last 7.5 years. I've recommend it to countless friends, clients and associates but right now I feel like reverting back to the dark ages of requiring tenants to deposit cash/money order/cashier check into my account.
Also can u tell us how long it take for payments to be processed I've read some stories on this blog that processing time has been significantly longer than erentpayments 2-3 biz days. Your website also doesn't say what the processing time is.
How can I get a copy of your not user agreement.
Thank you
I seem to be in the same boat. Tenant paid 10/03 and said it was deposited 10/12, but I have not received funds. I am going to contact the CFPB regarding this matter immediately.
Hi everyone, I am very concerned about the matter regarding erent we have thousands of dollars that shows processed and deposited on the payment interface but have not been deposited into our account. The concern on our part is the lack of communication the company could not provide. They basically shut down their customer service center and have not responded to any emails regarding this matter. It is a must that a business that processes financial transactions operate in the highest fiscally ethical standards. Erent has shown me that this is not the case. Unlike others we have not received any correspondence from the company. The move from erent is beginning this month.... Some please invite me to the erent facebook page so I can be informed on the progress or lack there of.
Can't really invite you unless ur Facebook friends. U have to request to join. Search for "erentpayment discussion group" you'll be approved within minutes
You need to get your tenants to submit R10 claims at thier banks as soon as possible when you get into the Facebook group search for those threads so u know the immediate action you need to take.
@Shona Catlin thank you I have been on the facebook group