In June 2015, Tromp AG was appointed by Telkom SA, the South African telecommunications giant, to support the company in the development of a financial services positioning strategy. The assignment was completed in October 2015.

As with Telco’s all over the world, Telkom wished to explore opportunities in the FinTech space, where technology-enabled convergence is clouding boundaries between industry domains and organisations. The objective was to develop a strategic fit for Telkom to capitalise on financial services opportunities in the South African and regional market.

As part of the strategy development process, global trends and the local financial services landscape, were assessed. Considering Telkom’s inspiring vision of “Seamlessly Connecting People to a Better Life”, and Telkom’s market position, capabilities and reach, a strategic fit was developed.

Dr Philip Tromp used his collaborative approach, working with Telkom’s executives and key internal role players, to evolve the strategy.

Dr Philip Tromp has been appointed to act as lead facilitator in a project to review the use of interchange and to determine a model for the determination of payment interchange fees, in the South African banking system. As project champion and facilitator he played a leading role in the modernisation of the South African National Payment from 1994 to 1999, and has been active in the international payment system domain for the past 12 years. In this project experts in various aspects of the South African payment system landscape will provide assistance where and when required.

All payment streams officially recognised and registered within the South African National Payment System will be examined and addressed. Interchange, as applicable to payment systems, refers to the process whereby banks, through their devices, systems and procedures, facilitate the acceptance, collection, exchange, clearance and settlement of payment instruments, utilised by their customers, within a National Payment System.

Interchange fees will be reviewed in terms of whether they are feasible and/or justifiable in each payment stream and whether they are set at realistic and appropriate levels based on acceptable parameters. The project aims to establish a sustainable process whereby interchange rates can be reviewed from time to time as required by changing market conditions and requirements.

Payment instruments covered include credit cards, debit cards, credit transfers, direct debits, petrol / fleet cards, ATM and POS cash withdrawals as well as cheques. In addition, South African payment instruments developed specifically for the microfinance industry, referred to as authenticated and non-authenticated early debit orders (AEDO and NAEDO) will also be scrutinised.

The initial phase of the project comprises a study of the issues, stakeholder views and the body of knowledge available on the subject.

Tromp AG has been appointed to support the Reserve Bank of Malawi (RBM) in the implementation of a new core banking system and related ERP applications.

Towards the end of 2010 the RBM embarked on a project to replace its core banking system that has been in operation for many years. The system selected to replace the current system will comprise the Oracle Flexcube Universal Banking System, the General Ledger of the Oracle eBusiness Suite and a number of ERP modules to automate selected financial processes.

Tromp AG will provide project oversight, project management and change management support services to the management and internal project team of the RBM, encompassing the following:

Project oversight

Tromp AG will assist the executives of the Bank on an ongoing basis by regularly:

• reviewing the project status and deliverables;
• highlighting any gaps that could have a negative impact on the successful introduction and timeous completion of the new business solutions; and
• assessing user perceptions.

Project management support

Tromp AG will assist the Bank in carrying out its responsibilities in the implementation project by supporting the bank’s internal project team with, inter alia, the following:

• ensuring that project issues are resolved professionally and promptly;
• playing a leading role in the planning of the project together with the vendor’s Project Manager and the Bank’s Project Coordinator;
• understanding and identifying RBM project staff needs and goals and offer guidance to steer towards an appropriate solution; and
• advising on project complexities and escalating project issues to the Bank’s project steering committee and project sponsor.

Change management support

Tromp AG will advise the Bank’s project sponsor, steering committee and internal project team on effective change management in order to facilitate:

• obtaining and retaining the commitment for the implementation project from the various user departments;
• identifying and utilising internal business experts for the duration of the implementation project;
• obtaining the co-operation of the user departments and staff to adopt the reengineered business processes within the user departments and across departments;
• ensuring that training and user acceptance testing is effective and that the necessary re-skilling is done where necessary; and