Bank processing centers are structural divisions of banks. Processing system: description, features. Processing systems in Russia What is a bank processing system

How to open a processing account and why you need it

Today, using the services of banks, companies, and various financial institutions, we actively use cards, decide to open a merchant account and easily transfer and control funds using Internet banking and mobile banking.

Processing as a phenomenon

So what is processing and what is the history of its origin? Before general computerization occurred and the Internet became available to residents all over the world, there were only a few organizations that could participate in card payments.

• regulatory companies that independently issued bank cards and produced equipment for reading them;
• banks that issued credit cards under the control of regulators and carried out monetary transactions using information and guarantees from regulators;
• clients of the bank (company) who decided to open an Offshore Merchant Account and received funds into the account with a huge delay.

Later, thanks to the World Wide Web and the ability to check your accounts online, banks began to provide debit cards, not just credit cards. At the same time, companies appeared that created their own electronic currencies. At that time, there was no control in the field of electronic payments of electronic money. Such companies have essentially become electronic banks. Their activities began to be called Credit Card Processing, or simply processing.

Processing today

Today, many countries around the world have adopted special laws and regulations that are designed to regulate processing. There is a special license Internet Payment Service Provider License (IPSP), which allows companies to initiate clearing (debit money from one account and credit it to another). These companies must be members of VISA and Master Card and have a license in order to connect a processing account and arrange acquiring.

In addition to licenses, special regulatory documents have been created that specify the processing procedure itself (for example, Card Acceptance and Chargeback Management Guidelines from VISA).

Most processing companies have now built processing centers and entered into agreements with several banks at once. This position is both an advantage and a weakness (in fact, they do not own money).

Advantages of processing companies over banking structures:

• do not obey banking rules;
• work simultaneously with several banking structures, having the opportunity to choose the best benefits;
• work with electronic currencies;

Those who want to open a processing account that is carried out without bank control know that it is not transparent to controllers and regulators (unlike Internet acquiring, which is provided by prestigious banks).

This feature allows us to serve clients who have decided to open a high-risk merchant.

Such processing includes various tricks and tricks and can help hide even facts of fraud. Processing in such companies has a high price and is associated with significant risks.

If you decide to register a company and open an Offshore Merchant Account, you should know these types of processing How:

First type (white processing)- these are law-abiding processors (residents of the European Union or the USA). They cooperate with companies that pay all taxes and pose the lowest risks. The cost of this procedure is minimal and accessible to everyone. But they cannot compete with the second type of providers in terms of commission.

Second type (gray processing)- these are companies from various offshores, low-tax or zero-tax jurisdictions and from some Asian countries. These are companies that negotiate services for any business (including pharmaceuticals, adult sites, dating services, etc.). In order to contact such a company, find a contact and connect a merchant account, personal contacts and recommendations are required.

Last type (black processing)- allow the processing of any payment, even if it is illegal. It is not possible to register a processing account and conduct such activities without a bank, which means that the bank must closely help and cooperate with this type of processing companies. Often these are either offshore companies or Chinese banks. These structures maintain strict secrecy in view of the scope of their activities. It is impossible to reach them without an intermediary and a guarantor. In addition, there is no absolute guarantee that the processing will not close along with the “hold” amounts.

How to choose a processing company and open a merchant account

Our company has been working with various jurisdictions and companies for a long time, where you can register a company, obtain a Forex license, obtain a cryptocurrency license, open an account for a non-resident company or connect a merchant account.

Thanks to close contacts with many foreign banks and offshore processing centers, we will help you select a payment system and connect to it on the most favorable terms. To get more detailed information on how to open a high-risk account or arrange Internet acquiring, contact our lawyers today.

Using a bank card on the Internet, you can order food at home, buy clothes and pay utilities. Payment occurs instantly, which is convenient for both the buyer and the seller. Processing information when making payments by bank card is called processing.

However, a connection must be established between the bank and online sellers to allow electronic payments to be made. To do this, you need a so-called processing platform (payment service). To connect such a service, you need to contact processing service providers.

Processing services are providing access to a payment service for processing payments made from bank cards. In other words, with this service, an online business accepts card payments on its website. The payment service provider provides communication with acquiring banks, billing systems, etc. and is responsible for the proper quality of communication.

Several important points depend on the choice of processing center (provider of these services):

• How convenient is it for the user to pay for purchases on the site;
• is each transaction as safe as possible for both the seller and the buyer;
• how profitable the provider’s tariffs are for this online business.

The last point is of particular interest to anyone who sells goods and services via the Internet. Some providers charge a connection fee and set a fixed monthly rate, while others charge a certain percentage of the amount of each payment received for this service.

Today no one doubts the fact that processing services are a necessary part of doing business online. Net Pay is independent with a wide network of acquiring banks and other partners. In order to connect on the site, you need to send an application to our specialists. Net Pay offers convenient tariffs that are calculated individually for each client, depending on sales volume and field of activity.

English processing) – processing of transactions, as a result of which, in accordance with the amounts of transactions, the accounts of cardholders are debited by issuing banks and funds are transferred to the accounts of card acceptance points by acquiring banks. Information for performing these actions is generated by the processing center after receiving settlement information about transactions from the card payment system or directly from the serviced reception points. If the processing center of the local payment system serves card acceptance points, issue. one bank, all operations are local. P. consists of debiting the amount of each operation (possibly taking into account the commission charged for performing this type of operation) from the cardholder’s account and transferring this amount, minus the bank commission, to the account of the acceptance point. When a processing center serves one or more banks within the payment system, processing is carried out in several stages. Local operations are processed first. Settlement information on transactions with cards of third-party banks accepted from acceptance points is transferred to the payment system (presentation is carried out). In accordance with the information received, the acquiring banks must receive compensation amounts for transactions made. operations. The processing center, in turn, receives from the payment system information about transactions with cards of the issuing banks it services. at reception points serviced by third-party acquiring banks. Based on this information, issuing banks reimburse costs (by transferring the corresponding funds to bank correspondent accounts opened with settlement banks) in favor of acquirers.

In March, Visa and MasterCard blocked transactions on cards of four Russian banks, whose owners were included in the list of US sanctions. In response, State Duma deputies proposed to prohibit the location of operational centers of international payment systems outside Russia from October 1 and limit their right to refuse to provide services to clients unilaterally. This can give clients certain guarantees, but only if a number of conditions are met, experts warn.

How it works

Information and technological interaction between payment participants is provided by the processing center. It is a complex and expensive software and hardware complex, which consists of servers, software for processing information, protection systems and prevention of operational failures.

Processing centers are different. Firstly, there are clearing centers for payment systems - this is what the deputies had in mind when they proposed obliging payment systems to have such facilities on Russian territory. Secondly, there are processing centers of banks that connect to different payment systems. Thirdly, there are centers of special processing companies, to which banks that do not have their own processing centers connect (such companies provide outsourcing services for access to payment system processing).

One of the most important tasks of the processing center is to ensure the processing of requests for authorization of bank cards. So, it is the processing center that checks the number, cardholder name, security codes and decides whether the requested operation should be carried out. The processing center redirects the request from the cash terminal to the payment system database. This is where the data is verified. If the card is valid and there are enough funds on it, then a positive response from the bank of which the buyer is a client is transmitted to the terminal in the store. At the same time, the processing center (the buyer does not see this part of the process) makes a payment order in order to transfer funds from the client’s account to the seller’s account. A complex operation takes place in a matter of seconds.

When purchasing goods via the Internet, the process of exchanging money between the buyer and the seller looks exactly the same, with the only difference that instead of a reading terminal, the card information is requested and transmitted further by software belonging to a separate company with which the online store has a service agreement. An online store cannot connect directly to the payment system processing center. To accept payments from bank cards, he must use the services of an intermediary: a bank or PSP (payment aggregator). Such an aggregator, for example, is Yandex.Money. It is important that the intermediary himself has cooperation agreements with global systems like Visa and MasterCard.

How payment systems can disable cards of Russian banks

“In general, regardless of the location of banks, transactions between banks for servicing cards pass through the servers of payment systems,” continues the expert. “Thus, if payment systems block a bank’s BINs, then transactions on its cards will not take place anywhere except for the network of terminals of this bank.”

Does the location of the processing center affect operations?

To build a clearing center for your own payment system that would serve only clients in Russia is an expensive and lengthy process, from 6 to 12 months. “Opening a clearing center is an expensive project,” confirms the Yandex.Money press service, without specifying details.

If the United States imposes sanctions, Russian banks that fall under them will simply be cut off from access to these processing centers. If they use the centers of the “national payment system”, then, of course, they will not be turned off, but you can forget about the operation of such cards abroad. The same goes for purchases using such cards in all foreign online stores.

A representative of Yandex.money told iBusiness.ru that “usually payment systems do not locate their processing (clearing) centers in all countries of presence, but if the operation of payment systems in a certain country is limited by sanctions, the presence or absence of their own local processing centers is unlikely will affect the situation."

Yuri Bozhor from Otkritie Bank says that the one-time costs of foreign payment systems for the construction of processing centers in Russia will range from $10 to $50 million. “Money must be spent on purchasing and setting up hardware and software. The technologies are completely clear; the issue here is purely technical,” he says.

Unlike colleagues from Yandex.Money, Bozhor believes that a processing center in Russia, which would be built, for example, by Visa, could solve the problem of sanctions. “If the data center is on the territory of Russia, managed by a Russian legal entity operating under Russian legislation and controlled by Russian supervisory authorities, then any command from the outside may not be executed. Especially if this process is described in regulatory documents,” explains the expert.

Valentina Kuzmina, director of the payment cards department at Promsvyazbank, shares a similar opinion. According to her, so that no one can interfere with national operations, they should not leave the country both when passing authorization requests and when conducting clearing. “If payment system processing centers that provide this are created, they should be controlled by Russian regulators, including tariff policy; it should be prohibited to disable any operations (except for fraudulent ones) and/or payment system participants without approval at the initiative of the payment system with regulators,” the expert suggests.

Does Russia need its own payment system?

Have you ever wondered how the banking system works? How do ATMs and payment terminals know how much money there is? How do they know what, where and how was filmed? Bank processing centers (BPCs) are involved in all this, because they are the ones who own all the information. What are these banks? What functions do they perform? How do they work? Who provides these services? Is there a risk area? Where are large units of this type concentrated?

Why are bank processing centers necessary?

First of all, let's deal with this issue. When they talk about banking, they mean special computing power authorized by certain payment systems, which has access to a base of participants (people) and personal computers (ATMs) that can use its capabilities. They provide authorization requests as well as transactions.

Bank processing centers record data about who made what payments where, who requested cash withdrawal from ATMs and many other actions (such as processing information about account limits and sending requests for authorization when the issuing bank does not have its own database for these purposes ). As you can see, there are many functions. But they are not all “equal”. Large institutions often have main processing centers that handle the management activities of other, smaller units.

How does the center work?

The operating mode can be of two types:

1. Direct work with the processing center of “your” bank. In this case, it is assumed that a person with his plastic card goes to the ATM of his institution. When he enters identifying information, it is transmitted directly to the issuer. Somewhere on a remote server, plastic cards are processed, and the information that he requested is returned to the person. Let's say how much money he has. If you request a large amount, the ATM will look at the data received and say that there is not that much cash. When you ask for a balance, the device will count and provide the data. When he sends information to the processing center that he has given a certain amount to such and such a person. Of course, there are some hiccups, but usually the scheme works flawlessly.
2. Interaction through an intermediary. In this case, the processing center sends a request to the bank that issued the card. If everything is fine, a response is sent back stating that the payment can be made. There are also databases of transactions, this facilitates mutual settlements between different banks.

Outsourcing of banking services

When a bank has its own BPC, that’s one thing. We looked at the features in this case a little higher. Now let's pay attention to the transfer of all operations to another organization (also called outsourcing of banking services). This is usually done by small institutions that have relatively little activity. BPC (or simply PC) can be called anything, from OJSC “Bank Processing Center” to “Let’s Calculate One or Two.” What is important in this case is the speed of fulfillment of the duties assigned to him, as well as the security of the processed data.

Additional functions

The division may also be assigned additional responsibilities: issuing new cards for enterprises with subsequent personalization is not at all uncommon. The processing center is the technical core of the payment system. It operates under very harsh conditions. This is not surprising, since the center is required to reliably process a large flow of transactions in real time. Therefore, there are also a number of strict requirements for the computing power of the processing center. He must prepare and present data for mutual settlements, process transaction protocols - and all this in just a few hours.

What is necessary for the operation of a processing center?

Conventionally, two points can be distinguished:

1. Computing power of a significant size. We have already discussed this above.
2. Developed communication infrastructure. The BPC must simultaneously work with a large number of geographical points that are located at a considerable distance. It is clear that efficient operation requires high-performance data networks. Their importance is so great that they are even classified as internal elements of payment systems, without which they cannot exist.

To perform the necessary tasks required by the bank, communication centers are used. They provide payment system entities with access to networks through which data is transmitted. It is also their responsibility to ensure that no one can gain access to them for illegal purposes. Their work to provide high-speed communication lines allows them to support the bank's processing center.

Receive information quickly. By modern standards, delays are small: they can be a matter of seconds. This is not surprising, because the specifics of how an ATM works with a client are also strictly regulated. The terminal cannot process a request for more than 30 seconds. But this, as already written, is a slightly outdated concept.

Geographical location

In the Republic of Belarus, a network of banks and large enterprises was created by OJSC Bank Processing Center. Minsk is the city where the head office is located. This means that data in the capital will be processed in a few seconds. It all depends on the geographical distance. OJSC "Bank Processing Center" also has branches. Grodno is the city where one of them is located. Therefore, here, too, various requests will be processed quite quickly.

OJSC Banking Processing Center is expanding and entering into new agreements with various large banks. Gomel (city) has already opened the doors of a new branch. Here you can make cashless payments using Belcard system cards.

As it became clear, Bank Processing Center OJSC is opening branches in many cities. Brest was no exception. You will find the PC in this city at the address: Brest, st. Molodogvardeyskaya, 3, bldg. 3.

The "Bank Processing Center" always notifies you about various technical work and preventative maintenance due to which the terminals do not work. Mogilev, half of whose population are PC clients, turned off the terminals on May 21 before 7 am.

Licenses

To make sure that the processing center can efficiently perform all the functions assigned to it, it is necessary to go through certain procedures that regulate most of the nuances. They have been legally established in most countries, usually within the last 15 years. Issue licenses to all PSP/IPSP organizations. Their cost, as well as the opportunities provided by different states, vary in each individual country. But, to summarize, we can say that licenses allow certain companies, provided that they have agreements with banks that work with VISA and MasterCard, to initiate the procedure for writing off money from one account in order to subsequently credit it to another.

Additional Documentation

In addition to the above licenses, there is also regulatory documentation of companies that can determine the general rules of interaction in the global card payment market. This primarily applies to the previously mentioned organizations VISA and MasterCard. An example is the documentation of the first company Card Acceptance and Chargeback Management Guidelines. By the way, as the electronic payments market developed, there was a tendency that large processing systems acted as the basis for creating their own. But still, the overwhelming number of companies of this type work exclusively with one area. This is both their strength and weakness: they do not own their own money.

What types of systems do BPCs use?

Conventionally, they can be divided into the following types:

1. Whites are focused on interacting with companies that pay all taxes in their jurisdictions. They are classified as having a low risk of problems. But, alas, their activities are significantly complicated by high taxes, which creates some problems for them when competing with representatives of the next two points.
2. Gray ones include PCs that were registered in an offshore or low-tax jurisdiction. As a rule, companies of this kind are not very different from white ones. But they can earn more income by paying a smaller amount, and are also ready to work with almost any business: pharmaceuticals, sites for adults, trade on the verge of legality - it’s all about them. The only peculiarity is their unwillingness to work with clients who “came from the street.” Therefore, you have to connect personal contacts, reputation, and sometimes look for a guarantor.
3. Blacks deal with any payments. Even those that are openly illegal. For technical reasons, this is impossible without the bank that opened the account, so they work in tandem. Examples include odious offshore companies or Chinese banks. Due to the huge turnover, as well as significant risks, such structures are very complicated, and finding a conditional owner of this money is very difficult (but does not mean that it is impossible). In addition to the difficulty of establishing communication, there is also a very high risk that it can close at any time, and then the entire amount that was hanging on it will disappear.

About the Russian banking sector

Most financial institutions that issue their own plastic cards also have separate PCs. In this case, they act as a structural unit of banks, thanks to which settlements are carried out between participants in the system. They provide internal processing of transactions. BPCs that operate on the territory of the Russian Federation are also required to have a license from the FSB, which monitors the encryption of information.

Conclusion

As you can see, banking processing centers are an important component. In addition to performing their main functions, they are also assigned a number of additional tasks. They monitor the status of ATMs. And if the equipment sends a signal that the terminal, for example, is being hacked, the data is processed and transmitted to the security service.