Payroc, the Illinois-based merchant acquirer that processes more than $125 billion in card volume a year, published research on 28 October 2026 finding that 97% of software providers say slow or complex payment integrations have cost them revenue, based on a Censuswide survey of 750 leaders and developers at software vendors in the US, UK and Canada, according to the release. The Payroc research landed 18 days after Fintechbits covered the launch of Payroc for Developers, the company’s AI-native integration platform, on 10 October 2026.

What the Payroc research found

The Payroc research found that 73% of respondents had delayed or dropped a payment feature because integration was too costly or complex. Satisfaction is just as high: 97% also say their existing provider meets their needs well, and 80% say switching costs would keep them from moving even if they were unhappy. That is a picture of a sticky market, which is good news for incumbents and a hard sell for challengers.

On AI, 96% say it has already made integration faster, easier or cheaper, and 75% say they could adopt AI-powered or agentic integrations within seven to eleven months. Security is the most cited barrier at 43%, ahead of cost at 38% and organisational risk at 36%.

Read the Payroc research with the sponsor in mind. Surveys commissioned by a vendor tend to find the problem that vendor solves, and near-unanimous results such as 97% and 96% usually say more about question wording than about the market. The useful finding is the 80% who would stay put despite being unhappy. Payroc’s chief technology officer, Paul Vienneau, argues that integration costs show up as “launches that slip, features that never get built, markets they don’t enter.” That is plausible. For a payments company selling to software firms building embedded finance, that switching inertia is the real obstacle, and faster integration alone does not remove it.