ACL Success Story – Banking & Finance – Redecard S.A.

2010-10-01

Redecard S.A.

“ACL’s continuous monitoring technology equips us to detect real-time deviations in our data. We have moved from a reactive approach to a powerful, preventative audit program.”

Danilo Maik Sanches, Internal Audit and Compliance Manager, Redecard S.A.

As one of Brazil’s leading merchant acquisition and payment processing firms for retailers, Redecard S.A. continues to expand its thriving business. The internal audit team, however, was struggling to provide controls assurance by testing vast data volumes with limited sample files and cumbersome manual analyses. Redecard implemented ACL Audit Analytics to gain efficient, secure data access and perform powerful continuous monitoring of company-wide controls. The audit team has boosted its productivity with automated data testing and now provides a far higher level of controls assurance. Redecard has a flexible solution that offers full business oversight and helps the organisation to achieve its strategic goals.

Customer Profile

Redecard S.A. is among the leading merchant acquisition and payment processing companies in Brazil, and serves as the country’s main acquirer of MasterCard and Diners Club International cards. Redecard is responsible for acquiring merchants to accept credit and debit card payments, while capturing, transmitting, processing and settling credit and debit card transactions. Redecard also offers additional products and services, including point of sale (POS) electronic equipment rentals, prepayment to merchants of receivables from credit card sales, check verification services through the POS electronic equipment and capture, and transmission services for voucher and private label card transactions. In 2007 Redecard captured and processed approximately 1.8 billion transactions from over one million affiliated merchants and posted a net income of £293 million.

Challenges

Redecard S.A. is continually working to increase card activation levels and market penetration within its capture network, while developing and implementing new technologies. At the same time, Redecard must comply with Brazilian Securities Market (CVM) regulations and adhere to brand standards outlined by MasterCard and Diners Club International.

Redecard handles over 1.8 billion annual transactions from more than one million affiliated merchants – increasing as the company expands into new markets. The internal audit department was performing compliance tests on a sporadic basis with limited data files. This sample-based auditing strategy did not provide full assurance that Redecard was compliant with brand standards and national regulations.

Internal auditors also needed a more secure, reliable way to access transactional data and limit time-consuming manual analyses. Tests were slow and the random sampling procedures forced Redecard to take a reactive, rather than a proactive approach to controls investigations.

Solution

ACL technology now enables Redecard internal auditors to perform continuous controls monitoring and risk mitigation. The team has significantly increased sample sizes and performs regular, automated data analyses with effective coverage of the vast number of business transactions it processes each and every day.

Redecard chose ACL Audit Analytics technology based on its strong market reputation and respected client list. The company trained all internal control staff to master both basic and advanced ACL techniques.

Results

With ACL’s Audit Analytics solution, Redecard can access and open extremely large database files, which were impossible to analyse with other tools. Audit staff can quickly access critical data without risking data loss or compromising the security of sensitive customer information.

The audit team is enjoying enhanced productivity through automated data testing and has expanded its reach with additional activities and a shorter audit cycle. With ACL, Redecard can maximise time and resources – enabling audit staff to perform more powerful analyses without file-size limitations or slow manual techniques. Redecard has moved from a reactive response to a preventative, proactive approach to controls monitoring. The team has confidence that they are seeing the full picture and providing real value to the entire organisation.

ACL solutions now enable Redecard internal auditors to:

• Conduct regular, preventative controls monitoring
• Ensure secure data access and unlimited sample sizes
• Enhance business oversight and regulatory compliance