DNB Lithuania supports customers’ serial migrations with self-service XML testing

The wind of change is blowing strong in Lithuania’s financial sector. Less than a year after migrating to the Euro, banks and corporates are now busy to meet the fast-approaching SEPA deadline in January 2016. The country’s third largest bank DNB Lithuania partnered with XMLdation to aid its customers through challenging times and provide the best possible support on the market – an investment already paying off in satisfied clients, low error rates and significant relief at the support desk.

Paulius Antonovas, Head of Cash Management at DNB Lithuania, is in charge of the bank’s product portfolio in the Baltics and hears about the challenges of Lithuanian corporates on a daily basis. Having to face two major migrations in such short timeframe puts a lot of stress on corporates and banks alike:“Modifying systems first to using the Euro currency and now to replace the former legacy data exchange format with ISO20022 creates major challenges, for ERP developers, big corporations and small enterprises alike”, he explains.

An unprecedented sequence of changes

And indeed, as of 1.1.2016 every payment, with only the smallest companies exempted, will have to be transmitted using SEPA “the cloud-based approach was the best fit for our needs”procedures. Financial software all over Lithuania is currently being updated to comply with the requirements. The DNB manager highlights that the fast sequence of such fundamental changes is extraordinary, even for the constantly changing banking industry.

“Our choice of XMLdation’s Validator to support a smooth customer on-boarding was not just based on their reputation as the most advanced software on the market successfully used within DNB Group” Antonovas continues, “but because the cloud-based approach was the best fit for our needs.” In addition to finding a powerful testing suite, the business supporting team had to keep resources in mind: with an entire nation migrating to SEPA within twelve months – a process that took several years in the rest of euro zone – the need for support is enormous. The selected product’s ability to reduce helpdesk workload is key to allocate manpower where customers’ needs it the most.

Self-service support for high volumes of testing

Banks have various options to provide their customers access to XMLdation’s testing services, individually tailored to their minor specific requirements. DNB Lithuania decided to provide their customers with direct access to the validation service, without involvement of bank personnel.

The software is easy to use and corporates are able to start testing their implementations literally within minutes after requesting access, a feature that DNB Lithuania staff has received a lot of positive feedback on. But not only the instant sign-up, also the intuitive interface and detailed reports have been praised by the users of the service.

Looking at the deadline with calm

Several months away from the SEPA deadline, DNB Lithuania already looks at a range of satisfied customers which are ready to use ISO20022. And, reviewing the bank’s most important goal, Antonovas concludes: “the sophisticated self-service testing solution has significantly reduced support workload and increased customer satisfaction.”

About DNB Lithuania

DNB Lithuania is part of Norway‘s largest financial services group DNB Bank ASA that provides financial services to its customers in 19 countries worldwide. In Lithuania DNB provides comprehensive range of financial services to more than 800 thousand individual and bus