Difference between the Electronic and Wire payment methods

In short, the Electronic method enforces the existence of a supplier bank account and the Wire method does not. Therefore, use the Electronic payment method to generate instructions to your bank to make payment to a supplier bank account. Use the Wire payment method to record payment when you have used a process outside of your Oracle Payables system to instruct your bank to pay a supplier.

Electronic
Use the Electronic payment method when Payables will create instructions for your bank to make payment to a supplier bank account.
Typically, this communication is an electronic file that instructs your disbursement bank to pay your suppliers, and is in the specific format that your bank requires. However, you should use the Electronic payment method whenever you need to generate a document that requires a supplier bank account. For example, use it if your Payables system is set up to print letters that
you send to your bank to request that the bank make an electronic funds transfer directly into the supplier's bank account. Payables ensures that you have recorded supplier bank account information when you use the Electronic payment method.
Typically, to pay invoices with the Electronic payment method, users use a payment document with a Computer Generated disbursement type and use a payment batch or Quick payment to create a payment instruction file. The payment instruction file is saved in the ap.out directory for delivery to the bank, unless one of the following features is used to automatically transmit the instruction file to the bank: e-Commerce Gateway (for EDI payments), Automatic Bank Transmission, XML Payment Processing.
However, you can use localizations, or custom payment methods and payment formats to create any type of communication with your bank when you use the Electronic payment method.

Wire
Use the Wire payment method to manually record payment when you have used a process outside of your Oracle Payables system to instruct your disbursement bank to pay a supplier. Oracle Payables does not require supplier bank account information when you use the Wire payment method.
When you define payment documents for these payments, we recommend you use the Recorded disbursement type because you are simply recording a payment made outside of the system. Further we commend that you record the transaction with a manual payment.
(However, the system will allow you to use any disbursement type. For example, some users who regularly record Wire payments for multiple suppliers use payment documents with the Computer Generated disbursement type, create an electronic payment batch, and then delete the resulting electronic file.)