CLEAR Announces Advanced E-Payment Platform

New Zealand businesses processing credit card transactions will make significant time and cost savings thanks to an advanced new service being trialled by CLEAR Communications. Trials have demonstrated that the new service cuts a process that sometimes took more than two hours to around three seconds.

CLEAR Payment Gateway is an automated credit card clearing facility developed in conjunction with DPS, an innovative New Zealand-based company. Although other automated credit card clearing facilities are available in New Zealand, CLEAR's solution offers several innovations:

* The solution is rented rather than bought, freeing the enterprise from capital expenditure and the overheads associated with maintenance.

* Pricing is based on transaction volume, rather than transaction value.

* The CLEAR Payment Gateway can be used across all electronic channels to market (eg: Internet, IVR and Call Centres). This makes it ideal for any business wanting to improve its performance and reduce its operational costs.

* Comprehensive reporting adds further value to the product. Businesses can access a range of information about sales made through all electronic channels. For example, the number of transactions within a given time frame; the total value of transactions; and the number of transactions rejected by the bank. The reporting engine features the ability to create custom queries, easing the processes of sales analysis.

CLEAR's Strategic Business Development Manager, Online Services, Wayne Nicholas says banks and businesses alike will benefit from the service.

Until now, businesses processing credit card transactions have had to follow a time-consuming procedure to clear payments. Sometimes customers had already used the goods or services before it was discovered that their credit card was declined. This resulted in losses to both banks and businesses. (See separate case study.)

During the service's development CLEAR talked to all the major Australasian banks. "They told us that the market has been wanting this type of service for a long time, so CLEAR is anticipating considerable demand once our Payment Gateway is launched," says Mr Nicholas.

The service will be offered initially to call centres where there is high demand for automation of business processes. Delivery in these cases is offered via TCP-IP over a secure CLEAR connection.

ENDS

© Scoop Media