The Leader-Post
Tuesday, October 08, 2002

CUETS, First Data do deal

CU Electronic Transaction Services (CUETS) and First Data Corp. of Denver have agreed to work together to provide credit and debit card services to the Canadian financial services market, the companies announced Monday.

First Data will provide credit and debit card processing services for CUETS's 500 credit union and other clients throughout Canada. First Data also has acquired an equity interest in CUETS's merchant acquiring and processing businesses and will manage operations, risk and sales activities for the acquiring business.

Stan Kuss, CEO of CUETS, said CUETS's credit and debit card business has two sides: card issuing and processing and merchant acquisition, which involves marketing the MasterCard credit and debit card systems to retail businesses.

"We're outsourcing the card processing side of the business (to First Data),'' Kuss said. "On the merchant (acquisition) side of the business, we've struck a partnership with First Data.''

He said First Data is the largest company of its kind in the world and better equipped to handle the card issuing and processing work and merchant acquisition business than CUETS.

As a result of the deal, CUETS will transfer about 40 to 45 Regina-based jobs in the card processing side of the business to First Data by May 2004. "Those positions will go away,'' Kuss said.

But he said most, if not all, of the employees will be retained by CUETS to work in other areas. "We expect we won't require layoffs., In fact, we expect to hire more people.''

CUETS, which currently employs 400 people, including 325 in Regina, has added 90 more positions in 2002, 70 of them in Regina. CUETS has annual revenues of more than $100 million.