Source: First Data
First Data, a global leader in electronic commerce and payment services, is providing issuing card processing services to Société Générale Consumer Finance (SGCF) in support of new credit card programmes launched in Portugal and Russia.
The programmes now being introduced by SGCF subsidiaries CrediAgora in Portugal and Rusfinance Bank in Russia are part of a comprehensive suite of new card and loan products that Société Générale Consumer Finance is rolling out to consumers across Europe, Middle East and North Africa. Société Générale Consumer Finance is tailoring products and customer service support to the needs of each local market.
Société Générale Consumer Finance selected First Data in 2006 as its partner for the roll-out of its services across the region. First Data is providing credit card management and transaction processing from its regional hub in Bratislava, Slovakia, together with a wide range of back-office and value-added services (including fraud management, 24x7 cardholder call centre services and merchant support), supported from a number of different First Data locations to meet specific local country requirements. First Data is already providing services to Société Générale's well established consumer finance businesses in Greece, Poland and Romania.
Commenting on the new product launches, Jean-Yves Bruna, CEO of Société Générale Consumer Finance, said: "First Data is providing effective and timely support for the roll-out of our new card and loans programmes, while ensuring that we can achieve important economies of scale through the use of a single processing platform and standard systems across our organisation. By utilising First Data's services, we are also ensuring that our subsidiaries active within the European Union can take advantage of the opportunities that the new Single Euro Payments Area will provide from 2008."
Nadeem Shaikh, President, Western Europe, Middle East and Africa, First Data, commented: "Our agreement with Société Générale Consumer Finance is a major pan-regional contract of a kind that will become increasingly familiar as SEPA becomes a reality. Banks expanding across the region are looking for a processing and payment services partner cappable of supporting that expansion through regional and local operations that deliver a consistent, high level of service. First Data is particularly well placed to provide such support."