Smart-card payment system for petrol station

System «Sollar Cards» is a multi-purpose automatized system, combining in itself opportunities of electronic payment system on smart-cards and coalition system of loyalty.

Specialized payment cards are a convenient tool of account which is widely used in refueling business. It is attractive for the client because goods can be purchased under the fixed price, the owner of business wins because he receives circulating assets in the advance payment.

The system «Sollar Cards» also allows to control a discount policy of complementary (coalition) trading networks and networks of services. The basic features «Sollar Cards» in this plan - a big number of base variants of discounts, flexible and simple adjustment, opportunity of fast launching of new schemes of discounts and actions - for separate groups of consumers, for certain periods, for certain conditions. Not the last value has also acceptable, rather low (in comparison with analogues) cost of the system.

System of electronic payments

In «Sollar Cards» system the resources entered to a client on a payment card are distributed into two kinds of purses - monetary and commodity. The monetary purse is measured in a currency equivalent. In commodity purses the commodities are specified in the prices for a commodity unit, for example, for fuel - in litres, for packings of butter - in pieces, etc.

The important difference of «Sollar Cards» from analogues: the system supports not only the fixed purses for payment of fuelling, but also has opportunities for stimulation of the client, for example, purses for free-of-charge (bonus) car-washings or replacement of oil.

The «Sollar Cards» system allows to completely automatize the account of fuel and accompanying goods realized by means of smart-cards - with the set frequency all transactions about use of cards on points of service will be transmitted to the Operational center. The system supports the usage of several payment schemes and enables to choose the most convenient - an electronic purse, the limit scheme, etc.

Coalition discount system

The primary goal of the discount system - to promote increase in a turnover of a trading network and strengthening of its positions in the market. It is achieved due to

• Attraction of new clients - by means of smaller, than at competitors, price for the goods/services, more convenient forms of the payment, more attractive kinds of discounts, faster service;
• Keeping of existing buyers - accumulative discounts with time become more and more favourable, bonuses and gifts stimulate to make necessary volume of purchases;
• An individual approach to each client - allows to strengthen stimulus for new purchases due to an exact binding to personal volume of payments, to italicize VIP clients;
• Conformity to requirements of the market, especially if competitors also use discount systems;
• Cooperations with business supplementing (banks, other shops and service providers) - at joint usage of one discount system and its smart-cards.

Variants of discounts and bonuses in system «Sollar Cards»

Benefit from usage of the discount system directly depends on the kinds of discounts and bonuses which can be realized with its help.

At present the quantity of base variants of the discounts incorporated in typical delivery of system «Sollar Cards» - 38, and they are grouped in 9 groups. Examples of some kinds of discounts and bonuses (the concrete size of the discount can be changed):

• The night tariff: at purchases from 20.00 till 8.00 - 1 % discount from the sum of the order;
• Accumulative discount: at a total sum of purchases up to sum N - 0,5 %, up to (N+1000) - 1 %, up to (N+2000) - 2 %, etc.;
• "money-box": accumulative bonus system - a gift for the certain volume of purchases;
• Action: the discount 2,007 % from the sum of purchased goods for a period from 1st January till 10th January;
• Discount for a kind of commodity: the discount 1 % at purchase of the goods of the certain nomenclature (as a part of promotion of this commodity group or for the accelerated reduction of commodity stocks at insufficient volumes/rates of realization);
• Conditional discount: the special discount to separate groups of customers (for example, the VIP-customers, to members of "gold" clients club (Golden Card Club), etc.);
• Discount in a place of sale: at purchases in the certain shops or points of service (for example, for attraction of buyers to new shops);
• Contests: the discount 5 % to each 1000th buyer.

Managers of a trading network can develop and add new kinds of discounts. To create a new variant of discounts, it is enough for manager of the company to fill a few fields in the program, for example, as in figure on the picture.

«Sollar Cards» - three levels of management

The system «Sollar Cards» covers all three levels of management and three key elements of the discount system and account of payments on cards:

• Operational Center (OC) in which management over discounts is conducted (assignment of rules of discounts calculation, conditions of bonuses issue, etc.) and where the information about the clients, allowed disounts for them and payments operations made by them is stored. Data stored in the operstion center serve as a basis at preparation of reports and at analysis of actions and discounts being conducted;
• Places of sales, where the equipment for reading of information from discount cards and computer programs for calculation (according to set in OC rules) discounts for the given client;
• Discount/payment cards, given out to the clients:

Simplicity of usage of card of «Sollar Cards» system by the client

For the client the scheme of work of the system « Sollar Cards » is very simple. The client receives his payment-discount card at the office of a trading network, in which the Operational center of system is installed. One card contains various kinds of purses and a set of discount policies which the manager will establish for the given client. After giving out the card is at once ready for use in all places of sales.

High level of protection of information in the system «Sollar Cards»

In order to prevent not authorized information leakages (for example, to competitors) and in order to prevent abusings from unfair consumers or attendants, data on discount cards is protected by technologies applied for bank cards.

Protection of the information in the operational center is provided both at a program level (system of passwords and identifications of users), and by means of organizational actions of the company and the corresponding technical equipment of the center.

Basic differences of the system «Sollar Cards» from analogues

In comparison with similar systems of other manufacturers the system «Sollar Cards» possesses such properties, as

• Support of several kinds of flexibly adjusted payment purses;
• Big number of base kinds of discounts (38);
• Opportunity of fast creation and launching of new kinds of discounts and actions;
• Flexible and simple adjustment, high detailing of conditions (down to the separate client);
• Opportunity to use the cards of system both for clearing settlements and sales on credit;
• Low cost of the system;
• High security of cards (level of bank cards);
• User support of the system, regular updatings and improvements of the system.

Due to the modern technical solution and innovative opportunities on support of trading business, the system «Sollar Cards» allows to noticeably improve the quality of servicing and to strengthen positions of a trading network in the market.

Sollar cards: Smartcard based loyalty and non-cash payments system

In compliance with market requirements and growing competition “Sollar Software” team has developed “Sollar Cards” system as an alternative to the outdated non-cash payment forms – tickets and lists and as a means of customers acquisition and retention. 

Sollar Cards system uses the most recent electronic plastic cards of National Mass Electronic Payment System with a chip series SLE66CXXXP for client and security cards.

The usage of the cutting-edge bank technologies allows to protect the card from hackers’ intrusion.

Sollar Cards system is universal and can be used in any business area. It also allows companies to unite into coalition loaylty programs.

The system offers client cards recharge in an operating centre as well as in points of service. Thus the owners of the system receive the possibility of attracting more prepaid funds. Non-cash settlements of accounts help to avoid collection procedures.

“Sollar Cards” is an individual approach to each customer’s needs. A flexible mechanism of discount-bonus policies creation is a powerful tool for marketing specialists.

“Sollar Cards” allows to control effectively mutual settlements of accounts performed with the help of cards, approach each client individually and take a strict control over the money expenses.

Differentiate user rights between employees in the operating centre.

     Sollar Cards system offers the following advantages:

• Cards related operations list: circulation entry, personalization, issuing, returning, recharge, blocking, deblocking, relocation, withdrawal
• Sales management by cards with as detailed information as possible
• Effective control of mutual settlements with contractors and the possibility to block debtors’ cards
• Built-in batch management mechanism.
• All cards related actions history track management.
• Automated data exchange with points of services: data collection about sales and recharge, discount policy parameters and cards black lists sending.
• The system can be applied in any business area: gas stations, drug stores, shops, tourist agencies, restaurants, clubs, etc.
• Working mode: offline
• A set of basic reports for reporting and analysis

     Non-cash payments system

• Flexible approach to the work with various customer types:
• Work scheme “card balance” is perfectly suitable for private customers 
• Work scheme “account balance” is intended for organizations
• Several purse types support on cards: goods/litre/money
• Possibility to use limits for card money usage: daily/weekly/monthly
• Possibility to recharge customer cards right at the point of service

     Discount-bonus system

• Flexible mechanism of discount-bonus policies creation out of a big range of schemes and parameters
• Possibility to use one and the same card as a discount card as well as for non-cash payment
• Mechanism of a remote modification of discount policy parameters
• Several purse types support on cards: accumulative/bonus

     Reliability and safety

• Usage of hi-tech smart cards and bank technologies for card data protection
• Data transfer channels encoding
• Stable operation in bad quality connection conditions

     System openness

• Possibility of data exchange with other accounting systems: 1C Accounting, ERP systems, etc.
• Possibility of data exchange with ECRs of various manufacturers.
• Usage of platform 1C 8.1 offers the following advantages:
• Open source code
• Fast development tool
• Vast distribution on the territory of CIS countries
• Possibility of an independent improvement and support performance