Bank Zachodni WBK, the 4th largest bank in Poland, will be one of the first banks in the country to issue chip and pin cards to its customers - a year ahead of the mandated deadline for EMV adoption.
BZWBK has also started roll-out of EMV compliant Point Of Sale terminals in order to achieve EMV acquiring capability. To date some 1650 merchant terminals have already been upgraded in Poland, under-pinned by NOMAD CORTEX - the leading European card payments solution from NOMAD Software.
The new card payment solution will enable BZBWK to play a key role in Poland's EMV trials later this year, as both an issuer and an acquirer of smart payment cards, placing the bank firmly at the forefront of the Polish banking sector.
The latest version of NOMAD CORTEX will also enable BZWBK to extend its range of online financial services and e-commerce offerings, for example, customers will be able to pay their utility bills in real-time at ATMs. These additional capabilities will further differentiate the bank from its competitors, helping attract new customers and retain existing ones.
Pawel Wlodarczak, Head of BZBWK Chip Migration Programme, commented: "We are now live on a rapidly increasing number of terminals and are expecting near complete migration over the following weeks. It is only through the implementation of NOMAD CORTEX that we are able to attain such speedy transition, one that will secure our position at the forefront of EMV adoption in the Polish market."
Irek Wieczorek and Halina Szymanowska, Card Systems Development leaders, said: "We have been working with NOMAD intensely over the last year on the project, one of the most complex in our history, which ranged from hardware platform upgrades, the merger of two different systems and platforms into one, as well as the new software implementation."
Working together with NOMAD Software, BZWBK has also taken the opportunity to centralise its existing payment architecture into a single solution. The two old NOMAD CORTEX systems, previously located in Poznan and Wroclaw have been consolidated, a move which is already bringing cost savings, reduce resource and administration costs and helping achieve consistency of card products and services across the group.
John Yeomans, CEO of NOMAD Software, added: "We are delighted that NOMAD CORTEX is helping to establish BZWBK as a premier player in the retail and corporate market within Poland. The bank will be able to leverage additional business opportunities that arise with the adoption of EMV smart payment cards, providing innovative services that will appeal to a fresh customer base and help ensure its future expansion."