New cash management equipment is being implemented at those 150 BES counters that currently show the highest number of cash transactions. The new generation of Fujitsu cash recyclers allows BES to reduce cash operational costs through process automation.

There is less time wasted in balancing accounts at the end of the day, faster training of counter operators, minimizing of human errors and improvement in customer service levels. Fujitsu's recycling equipment guarantees dynamic and constant cash management, more flexibility when loading cash into ATMs and, consequently, a reduction in the number of trips by security vans.

Also, a monitoring solution was developed by Fujitsu's Portuguese team that will be used in Spain and Italy. Besides providing all the required statistics and reports, this tool allows real time on-line access to information regarding the status of the machines (alerts concerning the need for maintenance, for instance), ensures that data is in a format ready for use and determines the total amount of cash available in the whole estate of recycling equipment.

According to Paul Santos, Director of the Executive Department of Operations of BES "The installation of Fujitsu recycling equipment has allowed BES to reinforce the politics of cash recirculation and compliance with the present guidelines regarding the certification of bank notes. The platform of remote equipment monitoring creates additional value for BES because it is an innovative solution and a basic asset for the efficient management of such equipment."

Paul Ferreira, Head of the Bank's Unit of Fujitsu Services, commented: "This project is very important to Fujitsu, which already has a 20-year-old history in the introduction of new technologies in the top Portuguese financial institutions. This solution of cash management represented an additional challenge, because it involved the local development of monitoring and resource agility tools that will be exported now to Sppain and Italy".

Key benefits of the new recycling approach

Following ECB (European Central Bank) directives, a single area of recirculation and distribution of notes in the euro area was established, with the main objective of detecting counterfeit Euro bank notes and checking their quality by credit institutions and other professionals who use them.

To implement the necessary measures to protect Euro notes against counterfeiting (involving their detection and removal from circulation), the credit institutions and other entities that operate with cash must use equipment duly certified by Bank of Portugal.

Bank counters have been modified to promote efficient dispensing of bank notes and cash recycling. They will accept, dispense and control cash, freeing employees from these standard functions so that they can work on customer account management and the sale of new products. Cash recycling generates time and money savings, since cash is processed automatically at the start and end of the working day. These savings help justify investment in cash recycling equipment.