Card Management System           business/credit cards, IBM PS/2
Manage Your Credit Card Business on an IBM PS/2
 
Microbytes Daily News Service
Copyright (c) 1989, McGraw-Hill, Inc.
The Card Management System (CMS) from Application Systems lets
you manage a credit-card business on an IBM PS/2. It provides all
the facilities you need for processing new business and new
accounts, maintaining customer service, processing merchandise,
producing cardholder and merchant statements, validating charge
and payment data entry, reporting collections and activity, and
managing plastic cards.
 
At the heart of CMS is the concept of the Plan, which describes
the key features of the product, such as interest calculation
types, transaction charges, insurance, and fees, and defines the
limits within which you can vary these parameters at the account
level.
 
The CMS database incorporates a relational data structure
linking a cardholder with up to four accounts, and each account
with up to 10 plastic cards. Although the cardholder number, the
primary account number, and the first card number are usually the
same, this is not a system requirement; replacement cards are
issued with a different card number.
 
The Voice Authorization process informs the operator about the
status of the selected account, and it also reports any other
delinquent accounts belonging to the cardholder. In addition, the
authorization process checks the overall cardholder credit limit
and the credit limit for each individual account.
 
Other features include a Customer Information File (CIF) of
demographic data (information is held by cardholder, not by
account); multiple accounts per cardholder; multiple plans, each
of which can have different interest rates and transaction fees;
multiple accounts per merchant; and parameter overrides, at
cardholder- and merchant-account level, to vary Plan defaults.
CMS also generates comprehensive daily reports detailing all
activities on the system for control and backup.
 
CMS runs on IBM PS/2s with 4 megabytes of RAM and OS/2 1.1; a
DOS 2.1 version is also available that requires 640K bytes of
RAM. The system supports IBM-compatible nine-track tapes for data
exchange with Central Bank Clearing Centres and cardembossing
machines. English and German text is available for all screens,
messages, and cardholder communications; additional languages can
be implemented without changing programs.
 
Price: From L8000 for 5000 credit cards to L20,000 for
25,000 credit cards.
 
Contact: Application Systems, 35 Lea Wood Rd., Fleet, Hampshire
GU13 8AN, UK, 44-025-262-5919.
 
                              --- Martha Hicks
 
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