In the beginning of 2012 Erste Bank Ukraine launched internet-banking for retail customers. The system was developed by Poland-based Comarch company. Erste Bank Ukraine is the first bank in Ukraine implementing the system of the leading Polish vendor.

Implementation of Comarch’s internet-banking system in Erste Bank Ukraine was performed in two releases. The first release started its productive phase in the beginning of 2012 providing for basic informational functions and banking operations such as:

• access to accounts and cards information;
• blocking cards, managing limits;
• personal accounts statements drawing;
• transaction to the accounts within Erste Bank Ukraine as well as other banks;
• saving accounts refilling;
• credit cards repayment;
• products and services payment;
• regular payments and transactions forms creation.

Erste Bank Ukraine’s internet-banking operates in the real time mode, which is the most important feature of the system. Transactions within the bank are processed on the 24/7 basis, therefore money can be used at once both within ErsteWeb as well as for card payments. Transaction to other bank can be created anytime but the funds are transferred and available only within the bank’s operational hours.

Moreover, Comarch internet-banking provides for communicational function through the secure channel. Within the first release the internal mailbox system was implemented enabling customers to immediately contact with the bank’s Infocentre employees, as well as messages and sms system. Within the next release a range of other operations and additional options will appear and the communicative options will be enhanced. The productive phase of the next release is planned for the second half of 2012.

While choosing the internet-banking system, we studied the best European practices and were looking for a vendor that offered a comfortable user-friendly solution adaptable to Ukrainian market demands. Comarch system provides an opportunity to implement Erste Group’s best experience, is well-integrated with the bank’s IT-infrastructure and contains a set of necessary functions for creating new products that fully meet our customers’ requirements. Another important reason to choose Comarch was the fact that the company had their office in Ukraine, – comments Andriy Begunov, director of process organization and IT implementation division of Erste Bank Ukraine.

Internet-banking implementation for Erste Bank Ukraine is the second project of that kind for Comarch abroad and the first one in Ukraine. “The project was a success mainly due to similarity of Ukrainian and Polish markets and, as a result, minimal culture differences. Strong support from the bank was another success factor for us. We worked as one team with common goals in this project. The bank was open to our ideas, and did everything necessary to implement the project in time. What is remarkable, all project processes and tools in Erste Bank Ukraine are set in accordance to Western European banks. The IT-solutions are efficiently implemented in companies with such corporate culture”, – says Damian Grela, project coordinator from Comarch SA.