I sent a request for information to Cozy with the following question:
"I am trying to figure out the best system for making sure we get paid. All the bells and whistles are great but what I need is a solid system where my tenants put money in the account and then we get that money. We don't love the idea of a middle man 1- slowing things down and 2- allowing for a weak link to break down. We have been with Erentpayment.com but in November they had some vendor go bankrupt which caused them to take the rent from our renters and not give it back to us. Can you assure me that this will not happen with your system?"
here is their response:
"Hi Dax,
Thanks for getting back!
First off, I'm sorry to hear that you were affected by what happened with the eRentPayments payment processing debacle. I can definitely answer any questions you have about Cozy and hopefully set your mind at ease about how we're different from eRentPayments.
Cozy never takes custody of your funds during a payment transaction and our processing partner Stripe is a licensed money transmitter that moves your money on our behalf. When a tenant makes a payment to you, those funds travel from the renter’s bank accounts and credit cards and are deposited in the landlord’s bank account.
Our CEO did just write and post a blog post about how payment processing happens in Cozy that post is here:
https://cozy.co/blog/how-payments-work-at-cozy/
Additionally, both Cozy and our payment processor, Stripe, carry liability insurance. With that in mind, you should know that when you collect payments through Cozy, the only parties involved in your payments are Cozy, Stripe, and federally regulated and insured banks. We don't use intermediaries (as seems to be the case with eRentPayments).
Most importantly, Cozy never takes custody of your funds and all user funds passing through Stripe are kept in special “FBO” (For Benefit Of) bank accounts that are completely separate from Stripe's operating funds. That means that even in the event of a bankruptcy or other catastrophic event involving Cozy or Stripe, your funds are always safe and trackable.
That said, both Cozy and Stripe are well capitalized and there’s extremely low risk of either company suddenly ceasing or declaring bankruptcy.
I hope this helps, and please do send along any additional questions or concerns you might have.
