Check fraud is like that one uninvited party guest, who shows up with a plus one, and eats all the snacks. You didn’t ask for it, you don’t want it, but here it is—quietly draining funds, damaging trust, and leaving a mess for your team to clean up.
Unfortunately, many business clients don’t think about fraud protection until after that guest has made themselves at home.
Most business clients don’t think about fraud until they’ve had a problem with fraud, so usually we have to be proactive in presenting fraud solutions to them.
- Lisa Carbone, Senior Vice President at Salem Five Bank.
One of those proactive solutions? Reverse Positive Pay – a fraud tool that may not be on every bank or credit union’s radar, but probably should be.
In this blog, we’ll explain how reverse positive pay works, how it compares to traditional check positive pay and payee positive pay, and which business clients are the best fit.
Reverse positive pay is a check fraud prevention service that flips the standard process: instead of your business client sending you a list of issued checks, you send them a list of checks that have been presented for payment. The business then reviews and decides what should be paid or returned.
It’s the “reverse” of traditional positive pay—hence the name.
It’s like handing your client the mail each day and letting them decide what gets opened and what goes straight to the shredder. It gives them control over what clears their account—without requiring them to send check data upfront or monitor activity around the clock.
Let’s be clear: reverse positive pay is not the most advanced positive pay service in the fraud prevention lineup. But it fills an important gap, especially for:
Here’s how it compares to the other options:
| Feature | Positive Pay | Payee Positive Pay | Reverse Positive Pay |
| Who sends check info first? | The business | The business | The bank/credit union |
| Who verifies the checks? | The business | The business | The business |
| Includes payee name matching? | No | Yes | No |
| Requires check issuance file? | Yes | Yes | No |
| Best for… | Mid-to-large businesses with regular check writing | High-value check writers needing added payee validation | Smaller or less technical businesses who want basic fraud protection |
Reverse positive pay works best for businesses that:
Lisa shared how Salem Five Bank uses reverse positive pay to serve this exact audience:
If it’s not the most advanced option, why bother offering it?
Because it:
It also relieves pressure on your team. As Lisa put it:
Even more importantly:
Many financial institutions worry that any fraud solution will come with implementation headaches—but reverse positive pay is surprisingly easy to roll out.
Because clients aren’t required to upload check issuance files, onboarding is faster, less technical, and more accessible—especially for smaller businesses with limited systems or support.
From the financial institution’s side, implementation is equally manageable. Platforms like Alkami Positive Pay & ACH Reporting make it simple to configure and maintain reverse positive pay with minimal operational burden.
And once it’s live, adoption grows when financial institutions take a proactive approach to education. Lisa shared that Salem Five has been intentional about this:
By educating clients on their fraud responsibilities and showing them how the tool works, institutions can drive higher adoption, reduce fraud-related friction, and build deeper trust.
Reverse positive pay may not be the gold standard—but it’s a solid “good” option in a good-better-best approach to check fraud protection.
When offered alongside traditional and payee positive pay, it gives your institution the ability to:
And in a world where check fraud is only getting smarter, giving your clients any extra protection—even a basic one—could make all the difference.
