When it comes to improving payment processes in the corporate world, many decide to use the SWIFT network.
The need for a centralised access point is key – as well as advanced cyber security to allow fast, safe transactions to take place across the globe.
This is something Christopher Davies, Treasury Risk and Reporting Manager at NSG Group, knows all about, having spent four years on a project to find the best way forward.
Thankfully, after investing in a partnership with AccessPay, the global manufacturing group has found the perfect solution.
What Challenges Were NSG Group Facing?
Around five years ago NSG had a cash visibility problem that needed to be solved.
The world-leading glass and glazing manufacturer needed to streamline their payment operations and gain global visibility and control over their cash.
With a creaking ‘de-centralised structure’ it was time for change and a project was launched. Their aims were to increase cash visibility, become bank agnostic and allow for more agile banking.
After extensive market research, the team decided that they needed a cloud-based solution and chose SWIFT, a leading provider of secure financial messaging services.
Rather than a slow and costly DIY approach they decided to go through a SWIFT vendor.
Their wise investment led them to global fintech provider AccessPay.
Investing in a SWIFT Solution
The collaboration led to a new system for NSG Group improving productivity and security, utlising AccessPay’s SWIFT L2BA application.
“We have successfully connected our treasury management system, City Financials by ION Group, to the SWIFT network via AccessPay
We have also created a payment factory and have many subsidiaries using the system from several countries.” Christoper Davies, Treasury Risk & Reporting Manager at NSG Group
Wondering how it works?
AccessPay acts as a file-agnostic platform that automatically transforms messages to the correct format on behalf of the corporate client.
This means that varying file formats and manual uploads are no longer a problem.
“We wanted to move away from online banking platforms – they’re not very efficient due to the various file formats for uploads.
They also suffer from security issues in terms of file storage, significant time invested in systems administration, and, further down the line, audit requirements.”
How Can AccessPay’s Solution Benefit Your Business?
As well as cutting down manual time spent on payment tasks, connecting to the SWIFT network also provided scalability and security to NSG.
The potential to roll out a solution was key for the firm, who are listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange and have principal operations in 30 countries worldwide.
“Scalability was really important for us – we knew we wanted it to be a global cash management solution.
The ability to scale connectivity to multiple banks and multiple jurisdictions using multiple payment methods all through a single standard connectivity process was a real benefit to us.”
AccessPay’s Cash Management and Payment Automation services are a vastly streamlined experience when compared with the rigmarole of banking portal log-ins.
The visually-simplified solutions are predicated on accessibility and adaptability.
“It’s all really easily managed through AccessPay, the file transfer process is only really a matter of adding the folders to our batch jobs that move the files between our system and AccessPay, so there’s not a significant amount of work.”
The security focus was another major plus for the manufacturer, as they upgraded from using unsecure network drives to store files and folders.
“Now everything is double encrypted and passed via a secure pathway to a file transfer protocol folder.
It’s really secure and that is a big advantage to the group as it reduced the opportunity for fraud and any operational error in inputting files correctly.”
Speaking of the project Jack Clancy, Head of Professional Services at AccessPay said:
“NSG Group are a great company to work with and we are delighted that our Cash Management offering has improved their finance and treasury functions.
AccessPay gives you the ability to connect to the SWIFT network, which in turn, allows access to potentially 10,000 banks around the globe. Being able to see, control, and optimise your cash has never been easier.”
