Compass Plus News

Compass Plus Launches TranzWare Internet Banking

Thu, 29 Jul 2010 12:22:00 +0300

Compass Plus, an international provider of electronic funds transfer (EFT) and retail banking software to financial institutions, today announced the release of TranzWare Internet Banking, a fully developed Internet banking application based on cutting edge technology.

As a logical extension of the previous five versions, TranzWare Internet Banking represents essentially a new product with characteristics providing an array of options to establish a flexible, fully adaptive Internet banking system: both in terms of integration with external IT solutions and customisation of user interfaces and services.

The distinct advantages of TranzWare Internet Banking are primarily related to its modular system architecture enabling users to customise the way they view their accounts; resulting in an application appearance and functionality controlled entirely by the user. Adjustable parameters include the general appearance of the modules and the application, the layout of the modules on the page and objects and their attributes contained in a module (accounts, payment templates, statements, inquiries and more). With individual preferences being hosted by the financial institution, users have the same layout wherever they choose to access their account from.

The customisable nature of the technology extends to the financial institution, whereby an Internet banking home page can be designed to suit their specific needs by modifying the functionalities provided with the software or by developing and implementing their own widgets, or tools. The system includes an extensive list of capabilities, such as banking and card account management, online payments, transfers between accounts, correspondence with the bank and applications for products and services, among many others. Features such as currency calculators and news feeds can also be implemented.

“For the first time, banks and credit unions have the ability to design their own unique Internet banking system,” said Doug Varble, North American vice president of Compass Plus. “TranzWare Internet Banking enables financial institutions to enhance the user experience by allowing account information to be displayed based on what is most important to the consumer. Customers and members have the opportunity to create a truly tailored banking experience, and with the growth of online financial management, the Internet banking portal has become an integral service tool.”

Migration projects using TranzWare Internet Banking are already underway at a number of Russian banks. The Moscow Industrial Bank has begun trial usage of the product, using the modified widgets which support direct interaction for a banking system managing customer accounts. Michael Stepanov, the Head of Software Development at Moscow Industrial Bank said of the project: "Thanks to new TranzWare Internet Banking and the bank's specialists, the new version of the remote banking Internet service offered to Moscow Industrial Bank customers delivers straightforward and logical account management capabilities, whether for cards, deposits, credit or any other type of account. By management, we mean viewing the account properties, obtaining bank statements for a given period, making transfers and payments from the account and viewing contract information. The account data is not stored in the TranzWare processing system database and interaction with the accounts is carried out directly from the widgets that we were able to develop ourselves."

TranzWare Internet Banking is the latest addition to the TranzWare suite of products built by an in-house team of Compass Plus developers. The highly flexible architecture and single-integration structure of TranzWare products enable effective use of applications in a broad spectrum of business environments, as well as easy deployment and management. All TranzWare products are PCI DSS and PA DSS compliant.

The Vietnam Bank of Agriculture and Rural Development celebrates its five millionth customer alongside the launch of a new MasterCard product

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 14:30:00 +0300

On 12th July 2010, the Vietnam Bank of Agriculture and Rural Development (Agribank) organised an awards ceremony in Hanoi to welcome their five millionth customer to the bank, whilst simultaneously launching their new MasterCard product for businesses. These two events demonstrate the continuous increase in both the number of customers and quality of services offered by the leading commercial bank in Vietnam.

The ceremony was held late afternoon at the Melia Hotel under the theme “Fly high to success” with over 200 guests, partners and representatives in attendance. The celebrations commenced with presentation of Agribank cardholders number 4,999,990 through to 5,000,010, with a selection of monetary and other premium prizes.

The program of events continued with the official introduction of Agribank’s MasterCard Worldwide card for businesses, the 12th card launched by the bank to date. The new card provides businesses with numerous benefits such as a flexible credit limit of up to 300 million dong with set limits for each authorised company representative. Repayments can be made via the Internet, the company's total account balance as well balances of each individual cardholder are available to view online and credit card transaction notifications can be received via SMS to aid in controlling expenditure and reducing risk. This card is incredibly convenient offering relevant expenses in fitting with each businesses’ financial position providing appropriate support as they expand in the market. The card is operational at more than 1 million ATMs and 28 million POS terminals worldwide.

Mrs. Ai June Schult, Vice President, Director of Indochina at MasterCard Worldwide said of the project: “MasterCard always tries to take an active role in the development of payment solutions in Vietnam; we are cooperating with local banks and financial institutions to bring new payment products to consumers and enterprises. The launch by Vietnam Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development of MasterCard for businesses is a result of our cooperation and this is the first MasterCard card product for businesses in Vietnam. This shows our continuous commitment in Vietnam on the implementation of cashless payment solutions”

Since 2007, with help from Compass Plus and its TranzWare solutions, Agribank has continuously invested in upgrading its card solutions, rapidly becoming one of the key players in card business development in Vietnam.

About AgriBank:
Established in March, 1988, Vietnam Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (AgriBank) has been a leading commercial bank playing a decisive and important role in capital investment in developing the agricultural and rural economy as well as in other fields of Vietnam’s economy. AgriBank is the largest bank in Vietnam in terms of capital, assets, staff, operating network and number of clients. In its consistent effort to excel and to lead the market, AgriBank attaches great importance to the continuous modernization of its technology infrastructure and the efficient application of latest banking technologies.
www.agribank.com.vn

Moscow Industrial Bank successfully continues developing its processing system

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 10:50:00 +0300

During the first half of 2010, Moscow Industrial Bank has been successfully certified in Visa and MasterCard for 3D Secure Internet acquiring built on TranzWare eCommerce from Compass Plus.

A. Matreshin, Vice-President of Moscow Industrial Bank said of the project:
“Our bank now enters a new acquiring market sector and provides its services at the highest security level; as the bank makes use of not only 3D-Secure technology supported by a few Russian acquirers, but also TranzWare Fraud Analyzer supplied by Compass Plus intended to protect bank transactions. It is important for us that this system has been implemented and used in the largest e-commerce project in the Russian market - the sale of Russian Railway tickets. We currently use technologies which have been tested under severe conditions. These state-of-the-art technologies implemented in our processing center enable us to provide the same services to our sponsor banks.”

TranzWare e-Commerce is an integrated 3-D Secure compliant solution encompassing ACS and MPI modules, which allows advanced and reliable Internet transaction authenticity checks, whilst boosting extensive functionality. The solution is a part of Verified by Visa and MasterCard SecureCode programmes.

About Moscow Industrial Bank:
Moscow Industrial Bank is one of the largest Russian banks, ranking in the top 50, with a branch network extending throughout the country. The bank serves large number of corporate and retail customers, with a card issuing base of 500,000 cards and a network of 1,500 ATMs providing services for several thousand trade and service enterprises. Moscow Industrial Bank has provided sponsor services for other banks since 2009.
http://www.minbank.ru/

Compass Plus announces product capability to run on IBM System z™ environment using Oracle database server

Thu, 01 Jul 2010 12:56:00 +0300

Compass Plus, a company specialising in electronic payment solutions and retail banking systems has successfully completed scalability and performance tests on IBM System z™ environment for TranzWare Online and TranzWare CMS. TranzWare Online is a highly efficient, fault-tolerant engine for the switching, parametric routing and authorisation of electronic payment transactions along with an array for cutting-edge supporting functionalities. It is complemented with TranzWare CMS – a feature-rich comprehensive banking solution providing the tools to enable the efficient operation and management of card issuance and lifecycle, bank and merchant acquiring with a range of retail banking features. The IBM System z platform is uniquely positioned as the management hub at the heart of the enterprise computing environment, efficiently and securely handling mission-critical, complex and intense application and processing requirements. System z delivers large scale consolidation capabilities for savings of up to 80% in total cost of ownership compared to distributed platforms.

The extensive testing took place from 19th April until 11th May 2010 at z Benchmark, IBM Products and Solutions Services Centre, Montpellier (France). The testing was carried out on a z10 server hardware model E64 with 64 GCP configured with 384 GB of RAM.

The benchmark set under the conditions of real life production use clearly demonstrated that TranzWare CMS is capable of running all end-of-month procedures in less than 8 hours for at least 10 million active credit cards (all having a single billing cycle, i.e. all end-of-month processing for them occurring on one day). Six months worth of live transaction data and associated batch procedures as ran by the issuers during the course of production use were thoroughly emulated for this test. The system contained ten different types of revolving credit card products (in TranzWare CMS notation - contracts) with each contract generating four card transactions with issuer fees and commission calculation using different algorithms, one credit repayment transaction, two contract settlement operations on Due Day and Statement Day – all taking place monthly during the 6 month period. In addition, the system was tested using different sets of data (for example, overdue/non-overdue accounts, active/blocked cards, etc).

For the purpose of TranzWare Online stress testing, a test processing system containing a database of 100 million customers, accounts and cards respectively was created. Several application servers were used to simulate up to 54,000 terminals connected via different protocols per each device type (15,000 ATMs, 39,000 POS). The transactions tested included ATM transactions (Cash Withdrawal – 85% and Balance Inquiry – 15%) and POS Purchase transactions. All terminals worked in full emulation mode with limit checks, commission calculations, performance of full authorisation in Stand-in mode, authentication of cardholders, etc; also all ATMs were monitored by the system in full online mode.

Under the conditions of real life production use testing, 460 TPS were achieved with the average authorisation time in system peak load of 5 seconds for the POS transactions and 2 seconds for the ATM transactions. The maximum number of logical transactions achieved was 6,000 TPS. During the test no deviations in the system performance were recorded and the result unequivocally proved that the TranzWare payment solution has the capability to run on the Linux for System z environment, using Oracle Database Server 10.

Employing the methodology of stress testing the system by modeling real life production use as opposed to straightforward transaction switching is, in many respects, unique and is only performed by a handful vendors. However, this is the only true test that expressly shows how the system will fare in a real life situation.

Compass Plus and the IBM team were also able to run several tests with different volumes of issuing and acquiring data, which showed how the system behaves in various situations. This is especially useful in project management whereby Compass Plus will be able to better forecast server hardware requirements thus, saving costs for the new customers that state their business plans over the next few years.

Olga Demina, the Senior Vice President, CBDO and Global Sales Director of Compass Plus said of the project: “Banking and payment industries are being driven by customer expectations, tough competition and tightening regulations to provide impeccable and secure service 24x7 365 days a year - this doesn't come cheap or easy and requires enterprise-grade solutions to deliver at the appropriate level. We trust System z is the solution for such challenges. The benchmark has demonstrated that System z not only is a good choice for large scale credit card issuers, but it may be the only choice out there for the largest of them. We believe this benchmark to be crucial for our existing large scale customers who are considering platform upgrades to support their business in the future at the necessary performance level without any sacrifices of manageability and security.”

The level of professionalism offered by the Montpellier PSSC Competency Center team during the benchmark and the analysis provided afterwards will enable Compass Plus to improve the system further and extend the performance record set this time by a fair margin. Building on the success achieved in this project, Compass Plus is planning to engage the same methodology in testing the new products of other leading vendors in the market.

About IBM System z:
The IBM System z platform is uniquely positioned as the management hub at the heart of the enterprise computing environment, efficiently and securely handling mission-critical, complex and intense application and processing requirements. Its open platform and extensible design allow for efficient application deployment and infrastructure growth, providing exceptional flexibility and investment protection. System z delivers large scale consolidation capabilities for savings of up to 80% in total cost of ownership compared to distributed platforms.

Trade and Development Bank of Mongolia successfully complete certification in Visa with support from Compass Plus

Fri, 25 Jun 2010 20:25:00 +0300

With support from Compass Plus, the Trade and Development Bank of Mongolia (TDBM) has completed certification in the Visa payment system with EMV-card issuance. The bank has also certified the issuance part of its own e-Commerce solution (Access Control Server) based on TranzWare e-Commerce from Compass Plus with Verified by Visa and MasterCard Secure Code. TranzWare e-Commerce is a 3-D Secure-compliant solution allowing advanced and reliable Internet transaction authenticity checks (from both Issuer’s and Acquirer’s sides).

These projects are aimed at providing TDBM’s customers with innovative modern services and secure technology for bank card payments and to help the bank maintain their position as the market leader.

TDBM and Compass Plus have successfully worked together for nearly 10 years. During this period, a highly qualified team has been put together by the bank which, with support from Compass Plus specialists, is able to develop and implement exceptionally challenging projects.

Today TDBM is the largest commercial bank in Mongolia. The bank started developing its card business in 2001 by setting up an in-house card processing centre based on TranzWare products, and completed its Visa certification in a record period of time – only 3 months from the contract being signed. The bank is proactively developing agency programs by making the outsourcing services of its processing centre available to other banks in Mongolia.

About Trade and Development Bank of Mongolia:
2010 marks Trade and Development Bank of Mongolia’s 20th anniversary, becoming the oldest and one of the largest banks in Mongolia. TDBM prides itself for its leading position as the universal banking service provider, offering a full range of services, including large corporate, SME and retail lending, deposit-taking, trade finance, remittance, cash management, treasury, foreign exchange and investment banking. TDBM acts as a primary lender to most of the country’s leading corporations as well as foreign corporations and foreign representative offices across all major industrial and commercial sectors with a constantly innovating range of universal banking products and services delivered with dynamism and excellence in service and quality.

Compass Plus Launches TranzWare Mobile Banking

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 11:16:00 +0300

Compass Plus, an international provider of electronic funds transfer (EFT) and retail banking technology to financial institutions, today announced the release of its enhanced TranzWare Mobile Banking product to enable its clients to provide an end-to-end mobile banking solution to a broader range of consumers.

TranzWare Mobile Banking enables banks and credit unions to expand the convenience of online banking to consumers’ mobile devices, providing access to Internet banking features such as details and statements for multiple accounts; management of debit and credit cards; bill pay functionality; person-to-person payments; and the ordering of the institution’s products and services. The platform can be accessed by any smart phone user.

To offer mobile banking to consumers who do not use advanced smart phones, Compass Plus developed MIDlet, providing all of the functions of Internet banking in an interface that is adjusted to fit the screen and capabilities of a feature-limited mobile device. Previously, consumers with these phones would need to complete singular transactions through SMS messaging, with each one incurring the cost of a text message. With mobile Internet access through MIDlet, only the equivalent cost of one to two messages is used in checking multiple account balances and making several payments.

“As consumers have come to expect constant access to personal finances, institutions have answered by providing account updates through SMS messaging alerts,” said Doug Varble, North American vice president of Compass Plus. “It has become vital for institutions to offer more robust account management capabilities through mobile banking. Compass Plus’ TranzWare software assists banks and credit unions with integrating SMS messaging outreach and end-to-end mobile banking capability, creating more points of touch with customers and credit union members to strengthen relationships.”

TranzWare Mobile Banking is the latest addition to the TranzWare suite of products built by an in-house team of Compass Plus developers. The highly flexible architecture and single-integration structure of TranzWare products enable effective use of applications in a broad spectrum of business environments, as well as easy deployment and management. All TranzWare products are PCI DSS and PA DSS compliant.

Universal Payments Services Kuwait launches fraud prevention with the help of Compass Plus

Mon, 21 Jun 2010 16:05:00 +0300

One of the market leaders of transaction processing services in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region, Universal Payment Services (UPS) Kuwait has launched state-of-the-art fraud detection and prevention services in collaboration with Compass Plus, deploying TranzWare Fraud Analyzer in online mode for electronic transactions.

UPS has made the strategic and proactive decision to offer online fraud protection to their customers and VIPs to prevent fraudulent activity during electronic transactions and to comply with enhanced security measures from current fraudulent threats.

UPS is one of the leading TPPs (Third Party Processors) offering online fraud protection for card payments to financial institutions in the region. By expanding their services portfolio for the existing and prospective customers, UPS will continue to strengthen their leadership position in the region.

About UPS Kuwait:
Universal Payment Services, a Kuwait-Saudi partnership company with a capital of USD 50 Million is one of the leaders in the market of processing transactions and offers international, high quality electronic transaction processing services through high speed and robust electronic information network.

UPS is certified and compliant with Visa International, Master Card International and PCI for TPP services and card personalization.
www.upskwt.com

Home Credit and Finance Bank enjoys success with TranzWare Online and TranzWare CMS from Compass Plus

Wed, 02 Jun 2010 17:21:00 +0300

In 2008 Compass Plus won a tender to provide Home Credit and Finance Bank (Russia) with a retail banking system as part of the bank’s development strategy. Compass Plus offered both TranzWare Online and TranzWare CMS as key solutions for the large-scale project which has now been successfully implemented and up-and-running for over a year.

One of the key factors in choosing Compass Plus was the availability of the toolset enabling the description of business processes based on the workflow engine within TranzWare CMS. These tools comply with the bank’s requirements to provide universal retail banking services, helping the bank to achieve the required system work logic, and the operators to avoid any possibility of making even the slightest mistake. The multi-functionality of TranzWare CMS has enabled Home Credit and Finance Bank to provide a large range of additional bank products services to its clients.

One of the most significant projects involves “package deals”: a set of services based on a debit card account. The unique feature of these package deals is the well organized and logically constructed approach to satisfying the daily requirements of clients. The account package deals available are the Simple plan, Personal plan and Special plan, where the customer gets access to a vast range of services, the parameters of which depend on the chosen tariff. The bank’s customer, depending on his/her changing requirements, can easily switch between deals due to the flexibility and innovation of TranzWare technology.

After implementing TranzWare, the bank began actively operating current accounts, debit cards as well as dynamically developing its ATM network enabling the bank to implement new projects and improve the services offered to the customers.

According to Mr. Kirill Kibalko, Head of Software Development and Support Department and Deputy Director of IT Department, the collaboration with Compass Plus can be described as follows: “We consider the partnership with Compass Plus as efficient and positive, we appreciate the highly-skilled professional level of the team that implemented complex projects and performed constructive work with a large customer such as Home Credit and Finance Bank. In particular, I would like to mention that Compass Plus could reconstruct its project operation methods according to the requirements of our bank, having actually developed the individual production cycle for us.” The bank has been successfully using TranzWare solutions for more than a year, and has plans to implement projects such as deposit accounts, debit card insurance and a number of other projects, all using TranzWare.

About Home Credit and Finance Bank LLC:
Home Credit and Finance Bank LLC has been the market leader since 2002 and is now one of the leading bank retail companies in the Russian market. As of 31st December 2009, the bank’s share of the trade loans market amounted to 28%, and 8.5% in the credit card market. The bank has 82 representative offices, 175 offices, 7 branches and 250 ATM in various regions of Russia. HCF Bank offers its customers a wide range of credit products under different circumstances. The products are offered in more than 32 thousand partner shops in 1.200 Russian cities. The bank client base exceeds 16 million people. The bank ranks in the top 50 of Russian banks and is the leader in consumer loans. At the Financial Olympus awards, the bank was recognised as the best retail bank in the “Potential and perspective” category. According to the results of the national banking awards, the bank was awarded 2 nominations: “For development of banking services in regions of Russia” and as “Information open bank”. In April, 2008, during the 4th annual “Russian Financial Elite” awards, HCF Bank was announced as the winner in the “The bank of the year in consumer loans” category.
www.homecredit.ru

First Data Lietuva has expanded its use of TranzWare Interchange clearing system

Wed, 02 Jun 2010 17:21:00 +0300

First Data Lietuva has expanded its use of TranzWare Interchange clearing system in its in-house processing center, the largest processing centre in Lithuania for over 8 years.

Some of the key features of the project were the complete integration of TranzWare Interchange with the third-party processing solution and the use of the system to convert the clearing formats of the existing processing centre with international payment systems. During the project implementation process, Compass Plus specialists supported the clearing and authorization formats of the TransMaster system, used as the processing solution to ensure the capability of direct interaction with Visa and MasterCard. TranzWare Interchange converts clearing files from original formats BASE II (Visa) and IPM (MasterCard) into the TransMaster internal format and vice-versa, enabling the total automated processing of clearing/settlement transactions, including the full dispute cycle as well as support of MC SAFE-transactions.

TranzWare Interchange is also used for routing clearing files and converting clearing file formats for financial institutions served by the processor.

In addition, First Data Lietuva actively uses the TranzWare Interchange dispute subsystem and the report generation system significantly simplifying the interaction process with the international payment systems as well as facilitating analytical work on accounting.

According to Marina Fedorova, main project supervisor of First Data Lietuva, describes the results of TranzWare Interchange implementation as follows:
“The introduction of this solution to our processing system has allowed the significant optimization of resources and has improved the quality of services provided to First Data Lietuva customers, due to the automation of processes, stable performance and expansion of the system functionality. TranzWare Interchange is a flexible product that has enabled our specialists to independantly develop various solutions, necessary for solving local issues. The support provided by the professional team from Compass Plus was efficient and highly professional. The advanced capabilities and modern technological TranzWare Interchange platform means this product has the most potential for further development and application in multi-bank settlements, clearing and disputes.”

About First Data Lietuva:
First Data Lietuva is a division of the North American corporation, First Data, providing processing services over the world. The First Data Group currently has over 8,000 employees in 27 countries across Latin America, Canada and Asia Pacific region. Moreover, First Data is the largest Internet transactions processor, serving more than 4 million retail outlets worldwide.
www.firstdata.lt

Compass Plus Appoints Anthony Genovese as Vice President of Consulting Services in North America

Fri, 21 May 2010 15:40:00 +0300

Compass Plus, an international provider of electronic funds transfer (EFT) and payments technology to financial institutions, announced it has appointed Anthony Genovese as vice president of consulting services to assist with the development of new client relationships and TranzWare product support in North America.

Genovese brings more than 25 years experience in the payments industry to the position. In this role, Genovese further establishes Compass Plus’ presence in North America by cultivating relationships with prospective clients through participation in industry events, software demonstrations and the creation of sales materials. He also assists with solution design and training of the Compass Plus sales and marketing staff based on the needs of North American financial institutions. In addition, Genovese provides technical support for the TranzWare suite of products.

Prior to joining Compass Plus, Genovese held sales management and IT positions with banking and payments software providers throughout the United States and Canada, including S1 and ACI Worldwide. Genovese also has experience in managing product implementations, integrations and launches within previous roles.

“As we expand the Compass Plus client base in North America, it is important to have the people in place to support institutions’ needs and we are pleased to add Anthony’s sales and technology experience to our team,” said Doug Varble, North American vice president of Compass Plus. “His extensive background in the payments industry will be a valuable asset to the company and will complement the capabilities of the TranzWare products for North American financial institutions.”

Visit Compass Plus at stand 79 for Cards Middle East 2010

Thu, 13 May 2010 15:25:00 +0300

Conference: 17-19 May 2010
Exhibition: 17-18 May 2010
Al Bustan Rotana Hotel, Dubai, UAE

Cards Middle East, the largest cards and payments technology conference and exhibition in the Middle East is celebrating its 11th anniversary in the Arab region this year and Compass Plus is proud to take part in this internationally acclaimed event as an exhibitor.

Our team will be available throughout the conference at stand 79 for one-on-one discussions, answers to queries and general consultations and we look forward to meeting you.

JSC Liberty Bank (Georgia) successfully completes the MasterCard certification of its in-house processing centre

Thu, 06 May 2010 09:25:00 +0300

JSC Liberty Bank (former People’s Bank of Georgia) has completed the certification of its in-house processing centre in MasterCard payment systems (Issuing and Acquiring to include EMV-cards) receiving principal member status. This is another example of the successful long-term relationship between the bank and Compass Plus. Becoming certified in MasterCard enables JSC Liberty Bank to offer a new range of products to their customers and to supply new services to the market. Another added advantage is that the bank can now offer its sponsored banks the opportunity to participate in international payment systems.

Today JSC Liberty Bank has the widest branch network in Georgia and is the country’s largest card issuer (issuing over half the number of total cards) and carries out the project of servicing all state pensions and allowances for the government of Georgia. Since 2006, the bank has been successfully using its in-house processing and card personalization centre, built on the TranzWare product suite, to carry out innovative projects.

About the Bank:
Established in 2002, Liberty Bank is the seventh largest bank in Georgia in terms of total assets, with a 4.4% market share as of 28th February, 2010 (up from 3.7% as of 30th September, 2009). Liberty Bank has the largest branch network in Georgia, comprising of 175 branches, and serves approximately 1.2 million customers.
www.libertybank.ge

Compass Plus holds 1st International Partners Training Event (IPTE 2010)

Thu, 06 May 2010 09:25:00 +0300

As part of its continued global business development strategy, Compass Plus held its 1st International Partners Training Event (iPTE 2010) in Asia Pacific region for nominated TranzWare distributors at the offices of Total Information Management (TIM) Corporation. The event, which was held in Manila, Philippines from 25th to 29th April 2010, was attended by 5 reseller partner organisations operating across 9 Asia Pacific countries: Philippines, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Singapore, Brunei, Vietnam, Indonesia, Cambodia and Laos.

The training agenda covered all technical and non-technical aspects of Compass Plus payments and card management solutions portfolio comprising of detailed scripted product presentations, live application demonstrations and supporting sales and marketing related topics.

Nigel Kitson, Senior Vice President, Asia Pacific region commented “ This event is a key component of our international indirect distribution channel model to work with trusted partners that add significant value in the promotion of our world class application solutions portfolio. Our distributor partners share our vision and commitment and through this event and other aspects of our partner enablement program will facilitate the availability of our solutions to more customers in more countries throughout Asia Pacific.

The participants considered the event to be highly useful and informative and an essential element in a detailed trusted partner enablement program.

Salvador Aque, President of TIM Corp said of the event “As one of Compass Plus trusted and premier partners we were delighted to have the opportunity to host this event with our fellow distributors in Asia Pacific. We are personally very excited about this partnership. Compass Plus provides excellent quality products that complement our existing business operations in the Philippines.”

Compass Plus Releases TranzWare Products in United States

Wed, 14 April 2010 07:12:00 +0300

Compass Plus, an international provider of electronic funds transfer (EFT) and payments technology to financial institutions, announced it has released its TranzWare suite of electronic payments products to financial institutions in North America.

Compass Plus currently serves more than 100 banks and processors across 25 countries through the TranzWare product line, which was released in 1994. The products support an extensive set of financial transactions and card products through platforms including the Internet, mobile, POS and ATMs. In addition, all TranzWare products are created and built by one team using a single database, alleviating the problems associated with integrations of multiple products.

The key products being released include:
• TranzWare Online: A payments software providing ATM and POS-terminals handling, transaction routing and authorization, connectivity with payment schemes, and a multi-channel delivery platform including magstripe, EMV and contactless cards, mobile, e-commerce and Internet banking.
• TranzWare Card Management System: Manages the issuance and circulation of cards, including the institution’s relationships with cardholders and merchants. The software also includes a range of retail banking functions and aids in the management of personal and corporate accounts.
• TranzWare Fraud Analyzer: A customizable transaction analysis product with a set of tools for automatic detection of fraudulent actions. Fraud Analyzer allows the user to define its own set of red-flag situations and pre-determined rules for handling the suspicious transaction.
• TranzWare e-Commerce: Facilitates the secure use of payment cards on the Internet, providing interaction with issuers and acquirers, as well as the Verified by Visa and MasterCard SecureCard programs.
• TranzWare Claims Manager: A workflow management system that automates claim and dispute processing from bank customers and payment system members.
• TranzWare Cash Manager: Provides analytical tools to assist ATM network personnel with following the optimal cash replenishment time and amount to be loaded.
• TranzWare Interchange: Automates a wide variety of interchange functions, processing large volumes of data and efficiently clearing and settlement of electronic transactions.

“The TranzWare suite enables financial institutions to increase process efficiency and security, as well as cut costs, which enhances the levels of customer service,” said Doug Varble, North American vice president of Compass Plus. “The highly flexible architecture and single-integration structure of TranzWare products enable effective use of applications in a broad spectrum of business environments, as well as easy deployment and management. All TranzWare products are PCI DSS and PA DSS compliant.”

Compass Plus celebrates success at 5th User-Group 2010

Wed, 21 Apr 2010 14:05:00 +0300

On March 1st –5th, Compass Plus held its 5th international TranzWare User Group (iTUG) at the JW Marriott Hotel in Dubai (UAE), where the company’s existing and prospective clients, technology and business partners were invited to celebrate the amalgamation of state-of-the-art technology with the traditional hospitality of the Middle East.

The TranzWare User Group has been a continued success over the last 5 years with the latest event drawing over 130 delegates from 54 international banks, processors, technology solution partners and analyst groups from 23 countries worldwide. The event program covered topics such as; current electronic payment trends, new developments from Compass Plus and its many partners, and reviews of TranzWare products from current customers.

In the 2 years since the previous User Group, Compass Plus has made numerous large-scale developments within the TranzWare product suite and has expanded its reach worldwide with a number of key business agreements. Also within this time frame, Compass Plus has established 3 new offices; in Rio de Janeiro (Latin America and Caribbean region), in Singapore (Asia Pacific region) and in St, Louis, USA (North America region) and has gained 28 customers from 17 new countries.

The company signed its 100th customer at the end of 2009 leading to the celebration of entering its 25th country worldwide.

A sample selection of some of the presentations given includes:
- “Contactless Payment Technologies: as implemented and used in TranzWare products” presented by Maia Kheladze, Director of Plastic Cards Department, People's Bank of Georgia;
- “Reducing Processing System Downtime through Creating DRS-Systems and Upgrade Procedure Optimization” presented by Evgeniy Gryzlov, Project Manager, Compass Plus;
- “TranzWare Online Algorithmix: experience of using diverse ATM services” presented by Vladimir Korenevsky, Deputy IT-Manager, Head of Terminal Service Department, PrivatBank (Ukraine);
- “TranzWare products for retail banking: business process automation with TranzWare CMS Workflow engine” presented by Vladimir Gasyak, Deputy General Director, Home Credit and Finance Bank.

An example of some of the new developments released by Compass Plus include:
- A fundamental new approach to customer Internet services through the TranzWare Internet Banking and TranzWare Mobile Banking applications;
- TranzWare Merchant Portal: trade networks information service;
- A new approach that enables banks to perform cross-selling by means of personalized communication through remote service channels; - The practice of optimizing scheduled procedures by means of parallel data processing;
- The on-line integration of TranzWare with CRM-systems and front-office banking services.

Kapital Bank successfully certified in TranzWare Payment Gateway

Wed, 31 Mar 2010 14:46:00 +0300

In partnership with Compass Plus, Kapital Bank, one of the leading banks in Azerbaijan, has successfully completed the certification procedure of the TranzWare PaymentGateway module of TranzWare e-Commerce (including the Merchant Plug-In acquiring application) in compliance with Visa and MasterCard. This project was implemented to ensure Kapital Bank has increased security for payments made on the Internet. Now all transactions are authenticated in compliance with 3-D Secure standards (Verified by Visa and SecureCode), allowing additional customer identification and reducing the risk of fraud for both Internet buyers and sellers.

Kapital Bank’s processing centre is based on the TranzWare software product suite from Compass Plus, which helped to enable the efficient and successful certification process.

Kapital Bank pays substantial attention to the secure development of remote services for its customers. In the near future, the bank plans to complete the certification procedure of the issuing application, TranzWare Access Control Server, from TranzWare e-Commerce in VISA and MasterCard, enabling Internet transactions using 3 D Secure technology for Kapital Bank’s own cards. Customers of the bank will need to register to get an additional password for Internet transactions and will have assured increased security.

Kapital Bank, being universal in nature, provides a wide range of banking services both for corporate clients and individuals and has the widest network of branches throughout Azerbaijan. It is a bank of social importance – the agent-bank of the State in implementing major governmental and social programs. Kapital Bank is viewed as highly trustworthy in the international arena and is a Principle Member of MasterCard Europe and VISA International.
www.kapitalbank.az

JSC “Temirbank” launches MasterCard certified EMV-card issuance with help from Compass Plus

Wed, 24 Mar 2010 14:46:00 +0300

JSC “Temirbank” (Kazakhstan) has proudly announced the launch of EMV-cards issuance and support using the MasterCard payment system. The bank’s processing center was successfully certified in MasterCard payment system which included certification of the EMV-system. The bank was immediately able to begin using the payment system for the issuance and support of EMV-cards, which provide a higher level of security for payments than magnetic-stripe cards.

JSC “Temirbank” began its partnership with Compass Plus in 2006 when they adopted a new strategy focused on retail banking. A key part of this new strategy was the establishment of an in-house processing center and the TranzWare platform was chosen as the base solution. JSC “Temirbank” processing center uses key software products from Compass Plus, which includes: TranzWare OnlineTranzWare Card Management System and TranzWare Card Factory (a personalization system).

Compass Plus’ software development specialists have been focused on EMV since the technology became global and the standards and procedures of EMV-card support have been continuously supported by TranzWare. Today TranzWare supports wide range of VSDC and M/Chip specifications including pre-authorized debit, contactless payments and multi-channel authentication DPA/CAP.

“Compass Plus’ specialists provide competent support during certification in payment systems, - says Roman Kairgeldin, Head of Card Technology, JSC “Temirbank”. – Such support is an important part of our collaboration. TranzWare products support highly-adaptable settings and integration with different systems, which provides the required functionality and let us plan our technological growth on the basis of certified solutions”.

About the bank
JSC “Temirbank” was established in 1992 with the headquarters are located in Almaty (Kazakhstan). The bank is certified in VISA Int. and MasterCard payment systems and has a wide client service network: 21 offices, VIP-center, 341 ATMs, 115 cash withdrawal points, 100 info-payment terminals. JSC “Temirbank” actively uses innovative products which include: Internet-banking and mobile banking.
www.temirbank.kz

Compass Plus enjoys success at Cartes 2009 for the sixth year running

Fri, 27 Nov 2009 09:18:00 +0300

Exhibition: 17th – 19th November
Location: Paris-Nord Villepinte

Cartes and Identification was held for the 24th time since its establishment over two decades ago. The exhibition is one of the most important and exclusive events worldwide, where world class exhibitors, speakers and guests come together to discuss the new trends of the card industry. As an exhibitor, Compass Plus was proud to take part in this internationally acclaimed event.

Mrs. Olga Demina, Senior VP and Chief Business Development Officer of Compass Plus said of the experience: “Once again, Cartes proved to be a very productive show. The event generated numerous business opportunities for Compass Plus and allowed us to network with current and potential customers alike. We are looking forward to our continued success at Cartes next year.”

Warka Bank uses TranzWare platform from Compass Plus to launch portfolio of MasterCard products in record time

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 14:00:00 +0300

Warka Bank, Iraq, has successfully completed the migration of its processing center to the TranzWare platform and as a result, has launched a wide portfolio of MasterCard products in record time.

Warka Bank’s previous legacy system prevented the bank from growing its business successfully due to the lack of advanced card management functionality, inadequate product support and customer-vendor relations. Following the detailed evaluation and selection of the TranzWare platform by the team led by Mr. Saad Sadoon Al-Bunnia (CEO), and thanks to the partnership with Compass Plus and the migration to TranzWare, business is booming.

Warka Bank chose to implement TranzWare Online, TranzWare CMS, TranzWare Interchange, TranzWare Fraud Analyzer and TranzWare Card Factory from the Tranzware product suite with the intention of launching telebanking and SMS services in the near future. Warka Bank has also been implementing a strategy to roll-out 1300 POS terminals as of 1st Oct 2009.

After the completion of training by Warka Bank, the implementation project gathered momentum which resulted in the fastest certification of a platform with MasterCard in the MENA region. Compass Plus certainly met all of the bank’s expectations in terms of product functionality, responsiveness, support and product delivery.

The launch date for the MasterCard project was celebrated in Erbil on 1st November and in Sulaymaniyah on 4th November, with substantial media presence.

Of the collaboration between the two companies Hassan Hussein M.C.C / Deputy General Manager of Warka Bank said: “Iraq is a very up-and-coming country within the financial sector. As a key part of the Iraqi Banking Sector, Warka Bank are working hard to be the number one financial institution in all fields of the industry, especially within the e-services hub, which is the future of the business. Our experience with Compass Plus commenced when we decided to become a MasterCard member, they provided us with excellent support in migrating our existing card base and terminal network to the TranzWare system. Their professional team, who completed MasterCard certification in a new record time for the MENA region, worked with us as partners in achieving our goals using their TranzWare products, which cover all expectations any bank or processor may have. I think this is what makes the difference, giving Compass Plus customers a competitive edge.”

About Warka Bank:
Warka Bank for Investment and Finance is one of the largest financial institutions in Iraq with a network of 140 branches (with an additional branch in Lebanon) and 300 ATMs (190 online) located all over Iraq offering strong and constantly growing banking services. The bank was established in 1999 and now it is considered by the central bank of Iraq and all other financial organizations as the first private bank in Iraq.
http://www.warka-bank.com/

Compass Plus announces its products compliance with Payment Application Data Security Standard (PA-DSS) version 1.2

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 16:02:00 +0300

Compass Plus is one of the few companies that has been accepted to be compliant with the Payment Application Data Security Standard (PA-DSS). In accordance to the PCI Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) website, only 11% of payment applications have received PA-DSS certification so far. The confirmation of TranzWare product suite, including the flagship products TranzWare CMS and TranzWare Online, achieving full validation with the PA-DSS was received on the 21 of September, 2009. https://www.pcisecuritystandards.org/security_standards/vpa/

Visa has set a deadline of July 2010, by which all payment system participants must use PABP or PA-DSS compliant applications. All other software applications developed and sold by third parties will no longer be compatible with the Visa payment network. Compass Plus customers using TranzWare products worldwide will directly benefit from the PA-DSS compliance as it will simplify the procedure for achieving their own PCI DSS compliance that is also compulsory for all companies working with MasterCard and Visa and failure to do so will bring adverse consequences.

PA-DSS is a Council-managed program formerly under the supervision of the Visa Inc. program known as the Payment Application Best Practices (PABP). The goal of PA-DSS is to help software vendors and other related companies develop secure payment applications taking into account the PCI SSC requirements with regards to storage, processing and transferring payment card data (for example, CVV2 or PIN data). As a whole, these requirements facilitate changes in the software development and testing processes, thereby increasing the quality of payment applications.

Compass Plus worked with Trustwave Ltd. – a Qualified Security Assessor, in order to perform a PA-DSS assessment to determine the compliance of Compass Plus’ applications with the PCI Security Standards Council’s (PCI SSC) Payment Application Data Security Standard (PA-DSS) version 1.2.

Of the successful PA-DSS audit completion, Youri Koliakin said: "PA-DSS requirements for the developers of crucial electronic payment systems from a security point of view are dictated by time and are based on the financial industry’s recent history. Compass Plus have always made the security and reliability of its products and solutions the highest priority and our efforts in this field have resulted in the company being awarded the PA-DSS certificate. I want to take this opportunity to congratulate all Compass Plus employees, customers and partners. Also it should be noted that electronic payment system break-in methods are constantly improving, threats do not vanish but instead grow together with the development of payment systems and the increasing sophistication of payment software products. Therefore, following the established corporate culture of systematic approaches to problem solving, Compass Plus continues to maintain a high priority stance for the development of security, reliability and control in our products and solutions."

About Trustwave:
Trustwave is the leading provider of on-demand data security and payment card industry compliance management solutions to businesses and organizations throughout the world.

Trustwave offers a wide range of security services to help businesses analyze and test current information security controls and, if necessary, provide guidance to remediate any deficiencies identified. With its security services, Trustwave helpes to secure data, optimize network assets and mitigate the risk of data loss through shortfalls in application security controls. http://www.trustwave.com/

Compass Plus enjoyed success at Congresso de Cartões e Crédito ao Consumidor C4 Brazil

Mon, 31 aug 2009 09:12:00 +0300

Exhibition: 26-28th August 2009
Location: Centro de Convenções Frei Caneca, Brazil

Congresso de Cartões e Crédito ao Consumidor C4 was held for the fifth time since its establishment in 2005. The exhibition is one of the most important and exclusive events in Brazil, where world class exhibitors, speakers and guests come together to discuss the new trends of the card industry. As an exhibitor, Compass Plus was proud to take part in this internationally acclaimed event.

Regional Sales Director for the LAC Region, Rafael Marinho said of the experience: “C4 Congresso proved to be one of the most productive shows of the year, the event generated a number of business opportunities for Compass Plus and we are already looking forward to attending again next year.”

Compass Plus at Cartes 2009

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 09:12:00 +0300

Exhibition: 17-19th November 2009
Location: Paris-Nord Villepinte Exhibition Center, France

Cartes, the largest cards and payments technology exhibition in the world, is being held for 24th time since its establishment over two decades ago. Compass Plus is proud to take part in this internationally acclaimed event as an exhibitor for the 6th time.

Following on from the United States last year, Russia is the focus of CARTES and IDentification in 2009. As a key player within the Russian market and worldwide, Compass Plus is more than pleased to exhibit the innovative TranzWare™ payment solutions.

Our team will be available throughout the exhibiton and conference at stand 3 G 051 for one-on-one discussions, answers to queries and general consultations, and we look forward to meeting you.

Additional details on the exhibition can be found at http://www.cartes.com/

Compass Plus to sponsor and participate in the Annual International Conference - Retail Banking Business

Tue, 15 Sep 2009 09:12:00 +0300

The Annual International Conference - Retail Banking Business will take place in Yalta, Ukraine from 4th to 7th of October 2009.

Compass Plus is proud to be a sponsor and participant of this conference.

This year the conference is highly anticipated, gathering the main players of the market for discussions on the newest portfolio development strategies, the expansion of the customer base and improvements in efficiency. A distinctive feature of the conference is its focus on practice. Key topics this year are to include experience, ideas and forecasting from the leading banks: how to maintain, stabilise and provide effective growth in the retail banking market.

A Regional Director of Compass Plus, Andrey Chirkov will speak at the conference on 5th October at 2.30pm about the personification of remote banking services for private customers. We would like to welcome you to this presentation and hope that you will find the information of value in your business.

Compass Plus Announces Opening of New Office in Singapore

Tue, 02 Jun 2009 09:12:00 +0300

Compass Plus, a leading electronic payment software development company, has announced that it has opened a new office in Singapore to cover the greater Asia Pacific region. Although Compass Plus has had a presence in Asia Pacific since 2003, they chose to coordinate sales efforts via the Hanoi office and are now looking forward to promoting their presence within the AP region and the potential subsequent growth in customer base it will bring.

Nigel Kitson, the newly appointed Regional Sales Director AP said of the opening: "Our message to the market is a very simple one - we will confidently deliver, on time and within budget, function rich systems that will fulfill both current and future payment processing and card management business requirements. The timing is right for a new breed of solutions that are truly customer focused. The opening of our Singapore office confirms our commitment to the Asia Pacific region where we already have an established customer base."

Compass Plus enlists local retail payments expertise to lead the next stage of its international expansion into Asia Pacific

Mon, 01 Jun 2009 09:50:00 +0300

Compass Plus has announced the appointment of Nigel Kitson as Regional Sales Director for Asia Pacific. "As the company continues to develop and grow, we must continue to match it with appointments such as Nigel, who have a boundless supply of knowledge and expertise. We are delighted to welcome him to Compass Plus," said Youri Koliakin, Compass Plus CEO.

Mr Kitson, a former freelance consultant on the retail payments market, has extensive market experience having worked from 1993 to 2007 for ACI Worldwide in a number of roles including Vice President, Marketing and Operations Asia Pacific and Vice President, Sales Asia Pacific.

Of his appointment with Compass Plus he said, "I wanted to join a company that has a fully integrated comprehensive retail payments application portfolio, and a clear and committed business strategy rather than a half full melting pot of disparate systems. This one has it all. Compass Plus is a medium size company with great products, great people and fantastic growth potential. It’s very exciting."

Kapital Bank uses TranzWare solutions from Compass Plus to boost development and drive strategic growth

Thu, 21 May 2009 15:05:00 +0300

Kapital Bank holds press conference for double celebration: the implementation of their new processing centre and the millionth VISA card being issued since establishment.

On May 21st 2009 a press conference was held at the Kapital Bank headquarters in Baku, Azerbaijan, in conjunction with VISA and Compass Plus, to present an award to the customer issued with the millionth VISA card.

The celebrations went on to include the implementation of the bank’s in-house processing centre on May 5th, the first ever in Azerbaijan. The new centre runs on the TranzWare™ platform provided by Compass Plus, a leading international provider of electronic payment software and solutions. Svetlana Georbelidze, a representative of VISA, mentioned in her speech that this event will improve payment services and endorse new projects that will be available for all Azerbaijani citizens. Kapital Bank has the most extensive branch network throughout Azerbaijan and has issued the largest number of cards in the Republic.

Commended for its experience and reliability, Compass Plus was chosen to provide its expertise over 7 other companies in the running for the project. Rauf Rzayev, chairman of Kapital Bank, noted that it was not the price of the solution that was the deciding factor, but the extensive functionality of the banking technologies and Compass Plus’ proven experience in the implementation of innovative and large-scale projects. The company currently serves over 90 financial institutions, processing centres and national switches in 23 countries across the world.

Andrey Chirkov, Regional Director of Compass Plus emphasised the strategic importance of this project for the company in his speech: "We highly value this project as it is a new market for Compass Plus and we feel socially responsible whilst migrating large volumes of cards en masse."

The well organised work from the Compass Plus and Kapital Bank project teams allowed all obstacles to be overcome with ease; with the implementation process taking less than a year in total. Ali Akhundov, the Head of Kapital Bank’s project team stressed the migration process went without losses for both the bank and client, with a gap in service of just 6 hours and approximately 2 million cards being migrated within this window.

In conclusion, Chairman Rauf Rzayev of Kapital Bank noted that having the processing centre is strategically advantageous for the bank as it creates a platform for the long-term development of remote banking services and electronic payments. He went on to look at the bank’s plans for the near future with an emphasis put upon the implementation of a loyalty programme to stimulate the growth of electronic payments and to develop the retail network in Azerbaijan. Thanks to the newly operational platform, Kapital Bank will offer an array of new services, to include mobile and Internet banking. The newly established in-house processing centre will also enable the bank to significantly enhance the security of all card operations as Kapital Bank launched TranzWare Fraud Analyzer, an advanced fraud monitoring and risk management system that will help in the continuous struggle against fraud.

TranzWare products used in PrivatBank processing centre to ensure high efficiency in preparation for increasing volumes of card business

Mon, 18 May 2009 09:01:00 +0300

PrivatBank, the largest card issuer in Ukraine, has announced that it has now issued over 18.5 million cards with a growth of more than 20% - the equivalent of 3.5 million cards - over the past year with its terminal network increasing to include over 7,000 ATMs and 52,000 POS terminals. The role of technology is crucial to such dynamic card business development. The core technological function of the electronic payment infrastructure at PrivatBank is built on TranzWare solutions provided by Compass Plus to help ensure leadership in the market.

The increasing volume and dynamics of PrivatBank’s card business has put forward considerable requirements for the processing centre: not only for its exceptional reliability, but also for system scalability – the need for an increase in processing capacity without a considerable rise in cost (for example, costs of a company-wide hardware upgrade and subsequent project work).

The hardware platform at PrivatBank utilises a number of servers, with a typical server being equipped with 4 Intel® Xeon® dual-core processors and 8 GB RAM. Despite the rather modest specifications of the servers, merging them into the software-hardware cluster provides excellent results – the processing centre staff recorded a competitive peak rate of transactions per second which is in the running with results from far superior servers.

The PrivatBank processing centre successfully handles its increasing workload, taking advantage of the distributed architecture of the TranzWare Online front-office system. The uniqueness of this solution lies in the mechanism of the processing instance, a software component within which TranzWare Online server modules (controlling authorisation, routing, host-to-host interfaces, terminal drivers, etc.) are executed. Instances can run on one server or on various logically connected servers creating a single decentralised environment for the processing system. This allows the following to occur: balancing the loading of the multiprocessor servers, multi-threading tasks on several servers within the cluster and creating backup processes in different instances to achieve fault-tolerance through the duplication of software modules. TranzWare Online also includes a special multiprotocol transaction router, which monitors the availability of processing system instances. In the event of an instance failure, the router automatically switches the network interfaces to the backup server modules (executed within other instances, usually on the other cluster nodes).

The PrivatBank project, therefore, combines a high degree of reliability with ease of scalability. As workload increases, the distributed processing system is expanded to include a mid-level server which runs one or more processing instances, receiving a part of the transaction flow.

PrivatBank is one of the largest Ukrainian banks; it consists of a large service delivery network of over 3,000 branches throughout Ukraine. PrivatBank is the leading issuer and acquirer of payment cards in Ukraine and Principal Member of VISA and MasterCard payment systems. As of May 2009 the bank had issued more than 18.5 million cards and installed more than 7,000 ATMs and 52,000 POS terminals.
http://www.privatbank.ua/

Union Bank of Nigeria together with Compass Plus has successfully commenced a pilot run of TranzWare Online to drive the extensive ATM network of the bank

Thu, 23 Apr 2009 09:01:00 +0300

One of the largest and most capitalised banks in Nigeria - Union Bank of Nigeria Plc, together with Compass Plus has successfully commenced a pilot run of TranzWare Online to drive the extensive ATM network of the bank. TranzWare Online is a high-performance, scalable, multi-card processing solution providing efficient and secure switching, authorisation, driving and monitoring of an unlimited number of terminal devices and the handling of multiple delivery channels all on a single platform. This is the first stage in the implementation of comprehensive suite of TranzWare products for the consolidation of the in-house processing platforms that exist at the moment. Further stages will include implementation of TranzWare Card Management System and TranzWare Card Factory for the card management, issuance and personalisation along with other modules of TranzWare Online for POS-acquiring and connectivity with other networks within and outside of Nigeria.

Union Bank of Nigeria was established in 1917 as a Colonial Bank with its first branch in Lagos. In 1925, Barclays Bank acquired the Colonial Bank, which resulted in the change of the bank's name to Barclays Bank (Dominion, Colonial and Overseas). By the enactment of the 1972 and 1977 Nigeria Enterprises Promotion Acts, Barclays Bank International disposed its shareholding to Nigerians in 1979. To reflect the new ownership structure and in compliance with the Companies and Allied Matters Act of 1990, it assumed the name Union Bank of Nigeria Plc. Union Bank of Nigeria is one of the largest and most capitalized banks in Nigeria. It has big and diversified customer base which is served across its network of 405 branches spread out across the country.
http://www.unionbankng.com/

Compass Plus aids MSCC interface certification to Diners Club International Service Centre

Mon, 9 Mar 2009 14:00:00 +0300

Mediterranean Smart Cards Company (Egypt), a leading payment processor in Africa and the Middle-East, working in conjunction with Compass Pus, has successfully finished the certification of its interface to Diners Club International Service Center. MSCC will now be a regional processor for Diners Club International for a number of countries in Africa. Acquirers from all over Africa will be able to leverage MSCC’s state-of-the-art processing platform to enable them to connect to the payment system and this will provide the acceptance of Diners Club cards across their acquiring networks.

MSCC is a long standing partner of Compass Plus and has been using TranzWare™ products to drive their own business since 2006, as well as distributing them for several years.

MSCC is an Egyptian joint-venture company, offering one of the most sophisticated smart card processing environments to more than 50 banks across Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa. MSCC supports multiple schemes across stored-value, pre-paid, debit and credit products, using the latest processing technologies. Specifically, MSCC has established competencies in Chip, Chip-cards, EMV and smartcards. With core services to support card issuing, together with ATM and POS acquiring, MSCC can provide full access to the rapidly evolving global payment systems environment. In addition, the company is strategically positioned to provide complete private label or national card schemes as a one stop shop without the complexity of involving multiple suppliers and systems.
http://www.mscc.com.eg/

Compass Plus enlists local retail payments expertise to lead its international expansion into the LAC region

Wed, 04 Feb 2009 11:51:00 +0300

Compass Plus has announced the appointment of Mr. Rafael Marinho as Regional Sales Director for Latin America and the Caribbean. Of his new role within the company Mr Marinho has said “I am very excited about joining Compass Plus. Seeing as the company`s TranzWare transactional suite is the best product of its kind, I am sure it will uplift the quality of the financial services offered by the card issuers in Latin America and Caribbean, generating multiple business opportunities for issuers, acquirers and processors.”

Youri Koliakin, CEO of Compass Plus commented “we are delighted to welcome Rafael into the Compass Plus team, with his experience in the industry and in depth knowledge of the LAC region we can look forward to continuous development and expansion within our client base.”

Mr Marinho has over 12 years experience in the cards and payments sector of the Latin Market, having previously worked for numerous companies such as Aconite, Omnia, Net1 UEPS Technologies, GPS Tecnologia and BGS Smartcard Systems AG.

Compass Plus implements TranzWare PostPay

Wed, 04 Feb 2009 11:51:00 +0300

TranzWare PostPay is an automated EBPP (Electronic Bill Presentment and Payment) complex which allows an enterprise to expand the spectrum of services on offer. The system was implemented in METKOMBANK.

Compass Plus has been given the task to organise an automated bill presentment from various suppliers (of municipal services, cellular communications, Internet services, etc.) and to enable customers to choose a payment account and make payments via ATMs, electronic kiosks or Internet banking. The TranzWare PostPay system has been chosen to address these tasks. This system is capable of interacting with different service providers (using an individually set up file interface), consolidating the assortment of bills presented to a particular customer and enabling payment of these bills by means of the various interaction channels between a customer and processing centre.

“TranzWare PostPay functionality realised at METKOMBANK allows bank customers to look through the bills and make full, partial or advance payment, as well as set up a direct debit in an online mode, receive notifications about presented bills via SMS. In the future we plan to switch to our own processing centre based on TranzWare”, says Mr. Kogan, Head of Project Office at METKOMBANK.

METKOMBANK is one of the largest Ural banks and has Associate Member status in the Visa International payment system. The bank has issued over 70,000 cards. By the end of 2008 METKOMBANK has installed more than 60 ATMs.
http://www.metcom.ru/

Compass Plus has successfully implemented support for MULTOS cards personalisation in TranzWare Card Factory

Thu, 22 Jan 2009 09:20:00 +0300

Compass Plus has successfully implemented support for MULTOS, one of the smart card industry standards across all market sectors, in their personalisation system TranzWare Card Factory. The capability of TranzWare Card Factory, which offers a staged approach to card personalisation and provides comprehensive support for data preparation, card personalisation and issuing of EMV and magnetic stripe cards, has been certified by MULTOS Consortium.

Users of TranzWare Card Factory can now enjoy even a wider set of chip cards, ranging from JCOP and MULTOS to half a dozen vendors of proprietary cards, such as Gemalto Optelio, for their card issuance programmes as well as independence in the choice of personalisation equipment from all major vendors on the market.

MULTOS is an open, non-proprietary, all inclusive smart card operating system. To ensure its openness and to further advance its adoption into all smart card related markets, the control of the MULTOS specification is contractually invested in The MULTOS Consortium. The MULTOS Consortium is a group of international blue chip organisations, whose objective is to promote MULTOS as the smart card industry standard across all market sectors. MULTOS serve a multiple industry - from telecommunications, financial services, pay and satellite TV, Internet and e-commerce, public sector.
http://www.multos.com/