SWIFT Offering One-Stop Shop for Reference Data

Belgium-based global financial messaging services provider SWIFT announced today the launch of a suite of products designed to eliminate costly payment errors arising from bad data, and increase straight-through-processing (STP).

According to the company, 30 percent of non-STP payments are caused by bad reference data, and manual intervention to correct the data is increasingly costly.

Currently, many financial institutions buy similar products from multiple suppliers. SWIFT's new suite of products, called SWIFTRef, aims to allow companies access to Swift's range of directory services for relevant files and feeds, which will be accessed via the cloud and Web services technology.

The products are aimed at the 3,500 or so banks that process a significant amount of international payments and the many corporations that also comprise this market, said the company.

"The issue of poor reference data is only getting worse because of the sheer increase in global payments being made," said Patrik Neutjens, Head of Reference Data at SWIFT. "Our research shows that financial institutions are working hard to increase back-office efficiency to reduce costs. This requires tailor-made, integrated data that's constantly updated."

Bryan Yurcan is associate editor for Bank Systems and Technology. He has worked in various editorial capacities for newspapers and magazines for the past 8 years. After beginning his career as a municipal and courts reporter for daily newspapers in upstate New York, Bryan has ... View Full Bio