MasterCard Europe today introduced its Sepa 'Best-in-Class' Development Programme, designed to distill the best in European and worldwide payment solutions to benefit banks and retailers who are now implementing a SEPA-based future in electronic payments.
Through this programme, MasterCard will enable banks across the SEPA zone to leverage the best aspects of local programmes, and also introduce new global solutions to take European payments to the next level.
Speaking at the EFMA (European Financial Marketing Association) conference in Paris today, Alfredo Gangotena, General Manager, Continental Europe and SEPA (Single European Payments Area) Region for MasterCard Europe said it will take "greater innovation and creativity to help cement a viable future for SEPA".
"We recognize that to deliver SEPA's promise of 'same card, same experience anywhere cards are accepted' is a massive undertaking and investment for our customers across Europe," Gangotena said. "To help deliver this promise cost-effectively to our customers, we identified 149 unique payment card features and functionalities currently offered at a national level within the key euro zone countries. In moving to SEPA compliance we need to guarantee continuation of some legacy features, such as electronic purse, and leverage the very best of what the national schemes have offered, but with a twist - we need to offer options that are brighter and better, more robust and thus even more appealing to consumers and retailers."
The MasterCard SEPA Best-in-Class Development Programme
In some SEPA countries the debit card offering are basic, allowing only for cash withdrawal and point of sale purchase; in others there are remarkably advanced and sophisticated solutions. Across Europe there are a myriad of solutions and technical standards. In order for banks to deliver a truly borderless retail banking environment, a prospective new retail bank must, at minimum, offer the same level of service as currently on offer by incumbent national schemes.
The MasterCard SEPA 'Best-in-Class' Development Programme aims to deliver on a fully functioning competitive retail banking environment by cross-fertilizing these 'best in class' functions and services from individual countries' across the new SEPA region. This means identifying and implementing, for example, the easiest 'PIN change at ATM', the most convenient 'mobile phone top-up', the most secure 'mail order/telephone order' solutions, to name just a few.
Beyond taking the 'best in class' in Europe and making these available across the SEPA area, MasterCard is bringing to bear new global solutions that will bring Europe into the ranks of the best in class worldwide. Three such examples were unveiled by MasterCard at the EFMA conference.
MasterCard Europe's first EMV-based 'combo' card
Thanks to EMV technology, five banks in Finland (Aktia, Ålandsbanken, Nordea, Sampo Bank and Tapiola Bank) are introducing the first EMV based multi-function payment card that can combine debit and credit accounts to a single card. At the point of sale, the cardholder simply chooses to either debit a payment from their current account immediately or use their credit facility. The cardholder decides for every transaction, every time.
MasterCard's combo cards are already firmly established at the heart of the payment hierarchy in countries such as Brazil, Taiwan and South Africa where card take-up and usage has been high and cardholder loyalty strengthened.
MasterCard's European team partnered with the Finnish bank team to leverage both the 'combo' concept with the EMV offering. With SEPA and the mandating of standard EMV technology, the magnetic-stripe technology combo card that was already on offer in Finland could be upgraded to work for consumers the same way across SEPA and the globe wherever EMV terminals are available. MasterCard will be taking this innovation across Europe to the benefit of other banks, merchants and consumers.
The First Mobile Phone Technology to Power SEPA Generation Payment Terminals
MasterCard, in partnership with Value-POS, a worldwide payments terminal distributor, will be the first in Europe to harness mobile phone technology for a new SEPA generation merchant 'mobile' terminal. "With the need to rapidly expand acceptance locations for our payment cards to move from cash to cards in any country, this phone/terminal enables the taxi payment, the doorstep pizza delivery or the stadium popcorn purchase to be made just as easily, as quickly and as securely as the terminal in a shop or restaurant", said, Luke Olbrich, Senior Business Leader, SEPA Solutions, MasterCard Europe.
Based on GSM technology, the terminal combines the high security and functionality of a traditional POS terminal with the convenience of a mobile phone and at a fraction of the cost of current national use only terminals. Currently under trial in Germany, the terminal/phone is being carried in a fleet of taxis across Frankfurt-am-Main. Passengers slot their MasterCard or Maestro card into the reader built into the phone and then enter their PIN number into the keypad. Within seconds, they receive a receipt, created using infra-red technology and produced via a connected small thermal printer.
E-purse Migration through MasterCard PayPass
The contactless payment revolution, begun in America, and since taken up in Asia and elsewhere around the world has come to Europe. Maestro PayPass has been developed in conjunction with European banks to create a cost-effective, globally interoperative low value payment solution. In particular, given the hundreds of millions of 'plastic guilders, francs, and D-Marks' currently in circulation with the various national 'e-purse' schemes, Maestro PayPass is a seamless way forward. The London Launch of Paypass, on 3 September, 2007 signals the beginning of a true single currency in Europe.
Driving Value into SEPA
Alfredo Gangotena adds "In delivering a truly single market for payment cards, we are finding it's a far more complex undertaking than for cash, credit transfers or direct debits, given the millions of points of interaction and highly divergent levels of service available today at the national level, unlike these other payment means. With card payments, it is crucial that Europe move from a lowest common denominator "link' for payments and towards value-add; taking the best from across Europe and the world in order to compete in a global marketplace. Our "Best in Class" programme is delivering on this opportunity."