SMA Financial, SWIFT Regional partner for UK, Eire, Channel Islands and the Nordics announced that Hunting PLC, the international energy services provider, is implementing the SMA SWIFT Service Bureau for outsourced SWIFT connectivity. The project involved close co-operation between SMA Financial, Barclays Commercial Bank and IT2 Treasury Solutions and will deliver greater automation and straight through processing (STP) enabling Hunting to gain increased visibility and control over its global cash management.
Hunting was aware of SWIFT but had concerns about the complexity of any implementation. However, SMAs Service Bureau removes much of the technical overhead associated with connecting to SWIFT and offers a more cost effective solution to SWIFT connectivity. With the assistance of SMA and Barclays Commercial Bank, Hunting has joined SWIFT as a Corporate member via the Standardised Corporate Environment (SCORE) which will provide access to most of their leading cash management banks.
We wanted to explore how we could better use technology to add value to our treasury operations, says Chris Berris, assistant group treasurer, Hunting PLC. SMA were able to show us how other corporate treasury departments who banked with Barclays were connecting to SWIFT via their Bureau Service and integrating this seamlessly with the treasury management system from IT2 to improve cash and liquidity management.
Phase 1 of the project to establish SWIFT connectivity in the UK is on target. Once that has been completed, Hunting will look at rolling it out to their overseas offices.
D.C.