Logica Enables Banks to Deliver Cost Effective SEPA Direct Debit Mandate Management

Logica, a leading business and technology service company, has today launched a new solution that enables banks in the eurozone to deliver mandate management services for SEPA Direct Debit (SDD) payments to their corporate clients. Based on the flagship Logica All Payments Solution (LAPS), Logica Mandate Management provides the first single platform for both creditor and debtor mandates – saving costs and reducing time to market for banks. The solution, which is delivered through a cost-effective ‘pay-as-you-grow’ license model, automates the entire lifecycle of all SDDs and can be deployed in less than two months.

Zilvinas Bareisis, senior banking analyst at Celent, said: "The introduction of SDDs in November means that a single direct debit payments instrument – rather than one for each of 31 SEPA countries – can be used to collect funds from debtors. However, it means that responsibility for the set-up and management of direct debit mandates now falls to the corporates. While this won’t be mandatory until national schemes are switched off and full migration to SEPA is complete, the provision of an enhanced collection management service for corporates will give banks an early competitive advantage.”

Garry Young, director of corporate services for Logica’s Global Products Business, said: "SEPA is a catalyst for change, which will see corporates further reducing their banking relationships, as they seek to optimise cash management. With their corporate client base at risk to competitor offerings, this puts banks’ transactional revenues and balances under greater pressure. Payments and enterprise resource planning (ERP) are in our DNA, so we’ve designed Logica Mandate Management to help banks offer a better proposition to their corporate clients. The pay-as-you grow model keeps upfront costs to a minimum, reflecting usage of the solution, so if SDD volumes are slow to initially build, costs remain affordable.”

The on-boarding of corporate clients to the Logica Mandate Management platform is quick and easy. The solution integrates with a bank’s corporate services environment, effectively connecting with front-end systems, scanning services and, mostimportantly,any corporate back-end ERP or billing system. Functionality includes automatic upload of mandates, monitoring of expiration dates, BIC/IBAN conversions, flexible workflow and a debtor mandate database. This means the bank can also use it to provide enhanced services to personal customers, such as accessing mandates through e-banking.

In using Logica Mandate Management to provide this SDD service to corporates, banks can enable them drive payments efficiencies, take full advantage of SDDs and comply with European Payment Council requirements. The robust solution also helps corporates optimise cash management by standardising cash collection and specifying debit dates. By using this service from banks they can avoid a major investment or change in existing systems.

Banks using Logica Mandate Management will also benefit from Logica’s SEPA consultancy capabilities and its deep heritage in payments, ERP and billing.The company has over 6,000 ERP and payments experts and manages the billing process for many corporates, making ituniquely placed to help banks in the efficient on-boarding of corporates. Its LAPS payments hub is used by Deutsche Bank across Europe and currently handles more than three million SEPA Credit Transfers and 10,000 SDDs every month.

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NOTES TO EDITORS

About Logica

Logica is a business and technology service company, employing 39,000 people. It provides business consulting, systems integration and outsourcing to clients around the world, including many of Europe's largest businesses. Logica creates value for clients by successfully integrating people, business and technology. It is committed to long term collaboration, applying insight to create innovative answers to clients’ business needs.

Logica is listed on both the London Stock Exchange and Euronext (Amsterdam) (LSE: LOG; Euronext: LOG). More information is available at www.logica.com.

To know more about Logica Global Products Business, visit:www.logica.com/we-work-in/financial-services/financial-services-products/