UK Post Office reinforces commitment to Escher Group
Escher Group Limited, a leading provider of peer-to-peer messaging and data management solutions, today announced that it has signed an agreement with Fujitsu Services to extend the service term of its counter automation installation at the UK’s Post Office Limited. The contract will now run until March 2010 and extends several existing agreements between Fujitsu Services and Escher. It covers the full range of Escher products that are currently in use by Post Office Ltd., including Riposte(R), WebRiposte(TM), and Mails(TM).
“Fujitsu Services and Escher Group have delivered a counter automation solution that is ideally suited to address our present requirements and future needs,” said Alan Barrie, IT director for Post Office Ltd. “Escher’s technology is firmly established and will help us to achieve cost savings and improve our efficiency and customer service, and we anticipate that it will help us to increase our revenue over the coming years by enabling us to deliver new business offerings such as electronic banking, bureau de change, and other e-commerce services.”
“Post Office’s decision to continue with the Fujitsu/Escher installation until at least 2010 is a major commitment by our largest customer, and clearly demonstrates their trust in our ability to run large-scale managed services and systems integration projects,” said David Courtley, chief operating officer for Fujitsu Services Ltd. “Escher’s products have provided a solid foundation for Post Office’s counter automation system and are critical to the success of this project.”
Post Office Ltd. has been a customer of Escher Group and Fujitsu Services since 1996, when it selected Riposte for its counter automation project based on the platform’s demonstrated success in helping to streamline the performance of some of the most demanding transaction-based industries worldwide. In December 2000, Post Office selected Escher’s WebRiposte product for its electronic banking service.
Escher’s products are currently operating in 17,500 branches across the UK postal system, and are used by some 65,000 employees to serve 28 million customers each week. The UK installation processes in excess of 7 million transactions per day, which makes Post Office’s system the largest secure retail/banking computer network in Europe.
“We are proud of the progress that our systems have helped Post Office achieve to date, and honored by the confidence they have placed in us to take their business to the next level,” said Michael J. Murphy, president and CEO of Escher Group. “We remain dedicated to providing Post Office-and all of our customers-with the best counter automation solutions in the industry, and we are committed to continual innovation to ensure that they remain at the forefront of an increasingly competitive market.”
