Omikron shares its SEPA experiences at Payments Forum of the Polish Bank Association

Together with our Polish partner company, Andra Sp. z.o.o., Omikron participated at the bank forum “Payments 2010+” organized by the Polish Bank Association. The conference took part between 23.09. – 24.09.2010 in Warsaw.

In the course of two days, the many participating members of the Polish financial community collected information about topical subjects in the payments business in Poland. The main topics were : SEPA, E-Invoicing, Mobile Payments and Cards. On special invitation of the Polish Bank Association, Omikron reported on its experiences with SEPA in many European markets. This serves to reinforce the meaning of the active dialogue between Omikron and the Polish banking community and the Polish Bank Association on the current hot topics in Electronic Banking and Internet Banking.

During Omikron’s contribution, Dr Colin Smith, Head of International Business Development at Omikron, outlined the dilemma for banks in deciding on the appropriate approach to supporting SEPA, as well as explaining how Omikron has worked with corporates and banks to provide successful working solutions. Dr Smith explains : “With emerging standards like SEPA and EBICS, we are on the road to harmonization, but growth is slow and the regulations subject to constant changes – so we recommend to all parties to be as flexible and agile as possible – as we have done with our modular, end-to-end solutions for SEPA.”

Andrzej Jastrzebski, Business Development Manager at Andra adds : ”SEPA has an enormous potential for development and our aim is to have a full and rich level of services available for our market which is equipped for this dynamic development. This is in the overall spirit of harmonization initiatives, which also include secure communication standards such as EBICS. We see ourselves as perfectly equipped for Electronic Banking in Poland and throughout Europe thanks to Omikron’s pioneering approach to e-banking and payment products.”

Amongst other topics, Omikron was also able to report on its experience in collaboration with a corporate which is active throughout Europe : with Omikron’s support, DKV Euro Service became the first company in Europe to use the new SEPA B2B-direct debit instrument. The resulting timely implementation of SEPA payments resulted in the company being awarded the prestigious ”Adam Smith Award for Best Practice and Innovation 2010“. In the awards, allocated by the business magazine “Treasury Today“, DKV Euro Service received first place in the category “Best SEPA Solution“.