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Level Four Offers Guide to Best Practices in Outsourcing ATM Testing

CHARLOTTE, N.C.-(Business Wire)-October 2, 2008 - Level Four Americas LLC, a leading supplier of open standards-based ATM software, today launched its guide to outsourcing ATM testing. The current economic environment is squeezing expenditures within the financial services sector and forcing a renewed focus on operational efficiencies, which is pushing outsourcing higher up the agenda. In the past, banks have had varying degrees of success with outsourcing projects and have faced numerous challenges in delivering the expected value. In response to this growing trend, Level Four has created a guide that draws upon the past experiences of banks and aims to provide guidance on the strategies and processes required to make the outsourcing of ATM testing a success.

A survey conducted by the Management Consultancy Association (MCA) and the British Bankers Association (BBA) found that 41 percent of financial services managers expect to increase outsourcing due to the credit crunch. ATM testing is one key area where this trend is increasingly evident, due to the significant cost savings, which can result from outsourcing. As the complexity of ATM systems continues to increase, the headcount costs associated with manually testing ATM functionality have also been growing steadily. By outsourcing, banks can potentially make significant financial savings if the project is defined and executed properly.

Past experience in outsourcing shows that it is essential for banks to have a clear understanding of the issues involved. The MCA and BBA study found that only 24 per cent of financial services managers said they adequately understood the offshoring industry. This demonstrates the lack of understanding of how to get the most value from outsourcing and needs to be addressed if this strategy is to be implemented successfully. Level Four’s guide builds on the previous outsourcing experiences of financial institutions to provide a set of best practices to help banks to effectively outsource their ATM testing capabilities.

Ian Kerr, CEO of Level Four said, “In today’s economic climate, banks are looking at ways to cut costs and outsourcing is increasingly top of the agenda. While outsourcing can generate significant cost and efficiency gains, a number of points need to be considered in order for banks to get the process right. There is a tendency for banks to repeat past mistakes; for example it is often assumed that banks should outsource areas where they do not have expertise. In fact, the reverse is true. It is crucial that banks only outsource what they know, giving banks increased control over the process through effective internal management. There is a lack of much needed guidance on issues such as this, which may in part explain why outsourcing has generated mixed results in the past. The guide aims to provide essential advice to help banks that are considering outsourcing to do so successfully."

For a free copy of the Outsourcing Guide, please visit www.levelfour.com

About Level Four

Level Four’s integrated BRIDGE suite of open ATM software products has been developed to address the needs of ATM deployers seeking to maximize their investment in the ATM channel. BRIDGE is targeted at banks and ATM deployers who are running, or seeking to run, a modern ATM network based on the industry-wide CEN/XFS open standard. As a true holistic offering, BRIDGE recognises the needs of ATM deployers in the areas of installation, testing and monitoring as well as run-time ATM software.

Since 1995, Level Four has built an impressive global customer base of banks and payments processors including, Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds TSB, National Bank of Dubai, LINK, National Bank of Canada, CIBC, Bank of Montreal and two of the largest top five financial institutions in the U.S. Headquartered in Dunfermline, Scotland, Level Four also has offices in Dubai and Charlotte, NC.

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