Smart cards have gained traction in the financial services industries by providing greatly improved security. Many financial institutions are transitioning from magnetic stripe cards to smart card solutions to enhance security and add multi-application functionality to financial cards. EMV standards ensure that single terminal and card approval processes are developed at a level that allows cross payment system interoperability while ensuring data security.
"The EMV market offers a substantial opportunity for instant issuance," said Spencer Clark, director of international markets at DCS. "Financial institutions who issue chip-based cards can now use the same solution already trusted by more than 300 financial institutions to instantly issue Visa and MasterCard products at the branch level."
CardWizard integrates seamlessly with almost all core banking applications, card management systems, data preparation systems and services, branch automation platforms and network providers. CardWizard's design flexibility means that the investment in CardWizard is safe for the long term, no matter which other applications are changed along the way.
Both CardWizard Chip and CardWizard Smart Start options offer all of the benefits found in DCS' leading instant issuance and PIN selection software and consist of central and branch level elements. While CardWizard is used to instantly issue cards in branches, and can be used for bulk reissuance, many financial institutions will still conduct mass reissuance of expired cards through a bureau.
DCS' CardWizard Chip is installed, along with an in-house data preparation system, in the issuer's central computer room, allowing financial institutions to instantly issue EMV cards to consumers at each branch. DCS' CardWizard Smart Start leverages a remote data preparation service, allowing issuers to delay the investment in an on-site data preparation infrastructure. This 'pay as you go' option significantly reduces startup costs, compmplexity, and deployment time for instant issuance.
By outsourcing data preparation, financial institutions can delay or avoid altogether the costs of developing in-house chip expertise. The challenges associated with key management are also minimised by outsourcing. CardWizard Smart Start makes instantly issuing EMV cards almost as easy as magnetic stripe card issuance.
CardWizard Smart Start is ideal for several card issuer scenarios, including: Issuers that want to pilot EMV issuance without fully committing to the infrastructure investment; those currently using a bureau for EMV issuance that also want to instantly issue cards in the branch; issuers in the process of EMV migration that want to instantly issue cards; for issuers that haven't yet decided whether to centrally issue EMV cards through a bureau or in-house.