Switching the Switch

Moving to a new platform from an existing Switch may seem like a daunting prospect…endless paperwork, additional costs, discovering new bugs and an extended integration process, and the invidious probability of downtime and service interruption. At TJ (Transaction Junction), we appreciate that the practical implications are often painful and that many businesses may be discouraged from undertaking such a challenge. For this reason, we have made switching to TJ as pain-free as possible.

Having already undertaken our own migration, TJ is acutely aware of the processes needed for a successful project – incorporating efficiency drivers that deliver a remarkably straightforward process. As a Switch, we establish the link between the merchant, the bank and the customer, ensuring accuracy, reliability and unsurpassed processing speeds. Our integrated solution encompasses a wide variety of payment methods and ensures the purchase amount is automatically sent from the POS (point of sale) to the card payment terminal. This reduces human error because it negates the possibility of accidentally entering the incorrect amount while incorporating a seamless end-to-end reconciliation process to guarantee that the overall integrity of the solution remains intact.

Adele Kriel, Head of Key Accounts and Sales at TJ, explains: “Many of our new customers with an existing integrated payment platform who have switched to us have found that, through our Imbeko Switch, they have numerous options that deliver significant versatility and adaptability. We are also cost-effective and minimise client disruption by not needing to install any additional hardware to support our platform,” she explains.

Several of our new customers have unpacked their top reasons they decided to switch the Switch: 

TJ enables cost savings

Many of our customers come to us from other payment switches looking to reduce costs. We take cost-savings for our customers seriously, and while many of our competitors look for ways to charge their customers more, we look for innovative optimisations that enable us to charge a more reasonable fee.

One of the main ways we can offer a more competitively priced solution is by creating our own Switch, Imbeko, within which we have also embedded point to point end encryption (P2PE), enabling us to offer P2PE as an inclusive part of our offering, significantly reducing risk and costs at the same time.

Moreover, our pre-integrated P2PE solution also enables significant savings on third-party PCI overheads. While competitors can charge up to R10 000 per server per store for PCI, this is entirely unnecessary, and with us, we do not mandate our customers to purchase any additional hardware for P2PE. This also means network segmentation and other costly infrastructure investments are usurped through intelligent software solutions that have met the highest levels of security needed for payment processing.

Additionally, TJ customers are not susceptible to third-party price increases. This sets us apart from other payment offerings based on legacy platforms or outdated pricing structures that can see the cost of ownership snowball out of control.

Many of our new customers are delighted by our innovative pricing structures – allowing them to enjoy significant cost savings, sometimes up to 70% per month!

Enabling omnichannel solutions

While most payment processors only process either online or in-store payments, we do omnichannel payment processing. This allows our customers to use one payment processor across channels and enjoy efficiencies like a single overview of their transactional data, dramatically reducing the complexities associated with financial reconciliations regardless of interface or channel.

We process almost double the number of transactions than that of our closest competitor, making us the number one expert in the payment processing space.

Product reliability

Our ultimate goal is to process payments as accurately, securely, consistently and as quickly as possible.

Burger King, one of our new customers, has noted an 80% reduction in the number of failures since switching the Switch, a clear display of the accuracy and efficiency of our transactions.

Dedicated support

Customers often switch to TJ because of customer support issues from not having a dedicated support person and often must drive their support queries. At TJ, we ensure that each customer has an account manager, and we keep our clients up to date every step of the way when they log a support call.

Reconciliation and exception management

We provide all our clients with our Transpector 5 platform, which gives merchants an overview of all their transactional data through a simple and intuitive user interface. It allows them to filter transactions through various categories, download reports and reconcile differences. Often, there is a difference between what should be in the merchant’s bank account versus what is actually there, which can cost merchants a revenue difference of around 3%. Our Transpector 5 platform automatically calculates and displays the transaction exceptions, negating the need for a manual matching process.

Credibility in the field

We process over 2 billion transactions annually, have an annual transaction value of over R2 trillion, and have centuries of payment experience in our leadership team. Our customers range from top tier retailers, including all the SA Spar stores to small corner shops and e-commerce stores. We are integrated into over 50 POS systems and are doing new integrations all the time. We offer 45 payment methods and are constantly looking for new methods to add to our payment offering. On average, we process transactions 5% more efficiently than that of our competitors, and we have our engineers to thank because we have had zero downtime since 2013.

We have fantastic relationships with the banks and receive many referrals through them. We are integrated into the top five acquiring banks in the country and will soon announce our sixth.

So, how do you go about switching the Switch?

1. After discussing your payment requirements, we will send through a quotation and contract for signing. Once this has been completed, we can kick-off the process.
2. We will dispatch an engineer to your site for a site inspection to make sure all the necessary components are present (connectivity and ethernet points) to facilitate the installation, and anything that is not in place will be highlighted so that the store can make the necessary infrastructure changes, if needed, to accommodate the installation.
3. The devices will be ordered by our team directly from your acquiring bank for implementation in your store.
4. We do not install on separate hardware or equipment; our software is installed directly on your in-store server/cloud/POS, due to our solution being an internationally validated secure solution.
5. We will contact your POS account manager to ensure all is in order and ready for the installation.
6. We will liaise with them and co-ordinate as they will need to be involved on the day of installation. On the day of the installation, we will have an onsite team to implement the devices and ensure the connectivity is working and transactions are processed correctly.
7. After the successful installation, we will provide Transpector Login details and training on how to use the portal to access your reports.

According to Paul Pretorius, GM: Product Delivery at TJ: “As a Fintech company with deep technical roots, we believe that nothing is impossible from a technological perspective, and this is not only the thing that differentiates us, but that helps us to set the pace.”

As the leader in the switching space, we are constantly looking to take on new customers, new challenges and new territories. Send us a mail on sales@switch.tj or give us a call on (021) 525 3100 to discuss switching the Switch.