By Business & Finance Financial technology firm Sentenial has warned that companies have only 20 working days left to avoid a shutdown of their payments systems on 1st February through a failure to ensure compliance with the Single Euro Payments Area system (SEPA).
SEPA will be introduced on 1st of February and provide a common payment processing system across the European Union. Companies that have not upgraded their systems will find that credit transfers and direct debits will cease to function, meaning suppliers and staff cannot be paid, and customers’ payments will not be received.
According to an ISME survey last month only 22% of the SMEs were SEPA compliant, indicating that many firms are either not aware of the need to change or are leaving preparations to the last minute.
When the switchover to SEPA is made Sentenial’s technology will be responsible for processing over €60bn worth of payments a year for companies and banks across Europe. Today Sentenial launched a cloud-based payment solution specifically for the SME market that provides a simple and safe option for companies to migrate their payment and direct debit services to SEPA.
Sean Fitzgerald CEO of Sentenial said: “Companies that do not get ready for SEPA won’t be able to pay their staff or suppliers; it is as simple as that. However it is certainly not too late to take action and hundreds of companies we are talking to started the New Year with upgrading to SEPA compliance at the top of their to do list.
It is important that companies choosing a SEPA technology partner work with a provider that has the experience and scale to deliver a top of the range service both now and into the future. Payments are too critical for any company to risk a second-tier service and the Sentenial solution is the safe choice for business owners who want to ensure they are ready for the 1st February deadline.”
OC Lite enables SMEs to move all their payments and direct debit data to the cloud for as little as €40 a month or €395 per year. The service is hosted on Sentenial’s award-winning Origix platform which has been chosen by five out of Europe’s top 10 banks and in Ireland is used by all the main clearing banks.
SEPA will enable cross-border payments to be completed as easily as domestic transfers, reducing costs and complexity for all bank account users.
Last month Sentenial announced it had completed over €8mn of new business in 2013, and in November that it planned to hire 110 staff by the end of 2014. 20 of these new staff have already been recruited.
