HSBC Merchant Services Presentation

HSBC Merchant Services provide card acquiring services for all sizes and types of retailer and other sales organisations. Their philosophy is to involve themselves closely with their clients' core business. So they don't just process card payments, they're always looking for ways of making their customers more successful.

Part of the machine that sets them apart is their powerful and user-friendly management information system, Global Access@dvantage. It's a constantly updated, interactive Web-based application that gives their customers on-demand, incredibly detailed and flexible data to help them run their businesses.

They asked me to build a demonstration system that would allow them to take Global Access@dvantage to their clients, without reliance on a usable Internet connection.

The brief was to provide a software presentation that HMS' sales people could show to their customers. Simple enough, but I felt we could add value by widening the possible use. So we built in a simple configuration menu that lets our client operate the presentation in a range of situations.

For a sales presentation, they'll usually set it to run without voice-over, and controlled as you would a PowerPoint presentation, using the mouse or spacebar to advance.

When they leave a copy with their customer, they'll usually configure it to run with voice-over in fully automatic mode. Doing it this way means that their narrative can still be heard even when they're not there to present. This is also good for exhibition use.

But not everyone has speakers attached to their computer. So clicking an option makes the system run with a popped-up narrative text box, automatically synchronised to the presentation.

Just adding touches like this gives our clients more utility, and so better value, from what we create for them.

Global Access@dvantage is a large, powerful system. It just wouldn't be practical in some presentation circumstances to try to demonstrate it interactively. So the main presentation flow includes a guided tour through some of the key capabilities, easing the presenter's workload.

But when HMS want to show the system's muscle, they can click into simulation mode and, to all appearances, they're running the real system.

Configurative manages a database of dummy transactions, producing realistic reports and keeping dates current so that it all looks right. But none of it is real, so there's no threat to privacy or security, and it all runs completely independently of any Internet connection.