European banks will increasingly look towards technology
partners to run their payments services as the
Single Euro Payments Areais introduced next
year.
Sepa will enable all European payments to be made or received
with the same rights and conditions across the region. Banks will
require new technology to achieve this and
sourcing is set to increase, according to bank ABN AMRO.
The Dutch bank is already a large user of outsourced services
but Sepa will increase this. Ann Cairns, CEO transaction banking at
the bank, said, "Strategic sourcing partnerships - including
outsourcing, off shoring and white labelling - will play an
increasingly important role as the payments industry focuses on
globalisation, regulation and performance."
The World Payments Report 2007, published today (13 September
2007), revealed that 58% of banks either already are outsourcing or
plan to outsource all or part of their payments activities in the
next five years. Some 68% of these plan to offshore the activity as
well.