UTRECHT, the Netherlands, June 25 /PRNewswire/ --

- Short Implementation Time and Limited Resources Required

As one of Europe's largest payment processors, Equens is ready for the
introduction of the SEPA Direct Debit (SDD) on 1 November 2009. Equens is
offering banks an economical, state-of-the-art internet solution with a short
time and minimal effort for implementation. With Equens' solution, banks will
be able to receive SDDs and fully comply with the SDD regulations and
implementation guidelines drawn up by the European Payments Council (EPC).

In contrast to the SEPA Credit Transfer (SCT) launched in January 2008,
the regulations banks are required to follow when processing SDDs are
complex. Moreover, the initial volume of SDDs is expected to be limited. Due
to the current investment climate for banks, the low volumes, and the fact
the banks do not need to be fully ready to receive SDDs until 1 November
2010, Equens' solution is especially appealing. Banks can log in to the new
internet solution via Equens' secure web portal to process their SDDs in an
easy and user-friendly manner.

In practice

Any bank can utilise the internet solution, or 'Debtor Bank Module'. When
SDDs are submitted, participating banks being debited receive a notification
from Equens and determine online how these transactions should be processed.
A video on the operation of the Debtor Bank Module can be viewed at
http://www.equens.com/sdd.

Equens will, based on this internet solution, also offer a module that
will enable to also send SDDs (Creditor Bank Module).

SEPA Direct Debit is one of the three main products of SEPA, the Single
Euro Payments Area, launched on 28 January 2008 with the implementation of
the SEPA Credit Transfer and already earlier with the SEPA Cards Framework.
SDD provides a common standard for direct debit transactions in the European
countries. These transactions are currently still processed using national
systems such as Direct Debit (United Kingdom), Lastschrift (Germany) and
Incasso (the Netherlands).

Note for the editorial staff

About Equens

Equens SE is the first truly pan-European, full-service payment
processor. As one of the largest and most innovative payment processors in
Europe, Equens is leading the market for future-proof payments and card
processing solutions. Thanks to an extensive and competitive service
portfolio and a flexible, customer-orientated approach, the company
seamlessly meets the requirements of the European payments market. With an
annual processing volume of 8.9 billion payments and 3.2 billion POS and ATM
transactions, Equens has a market share of more than 12.5% within Europe.
Equens has offices in four countries - the Netherlands, Germany, Italy and
Finland - and provides pan-European market coverage through services to
clients in eight European countries.

For additional information on Equens, please visit http://www.equens.com