ABN AMRO - MaxTrad

Cibar Inc, developed Internet Customer Connection (ICC) with the philosophy of making a state-of-the-art front end system that could be customized to incorporate each banking clients wants and needs. Using this philosophy, Cibar Inc, has worked with ABN AMRO in developing their customized version of ICC in MaxTrad. MaxTrad has been proven to be a success as it has been recognized as the best electronic service provider in trade finance for 2004 by Euromoney. This marks the third year in a row ABN's MaxTrad product has won or shared in winning the award. MaxTrad has also been recognized as "Best Online Trade Finance Site" as well as "Best Use of IT in Wholesale Banking".

Maxtrad enables customers to initiate Letters of Credit online. Authorization levels are built into the site security so that only the appropriate staff at corporate can do this. Once the bank approves the transaction, it issues the LC on behalf of the client. The process is as automated as possible to make it more efficient.

"Around 70% to 80% of all LC documentation contains mistakes. But by using the site, mistakes are reduced and ultimately, corporates have their receivables paid more quickly."

- John Ahearn, Sr. VP , ABN AMRO

Special services are available for importers, such as screens that show evidence of shipment. Within the LC application, the client can add purchase order details, with additional status screens and online payment initiation is also available.

MaxTrad is one of the few sites that enables a client to do standby LC's through the web.

For exporters there are email alerts for the arrival of any requested advice, amendments and payments.

(Source: Julie Dalla-Costa, euromoney.com)

When the second-largest exporter in the U.S. learned that its banks weren’t even close to offering Internet alternatives to paper-based export financing, E.I. DuPont deNemours & Co, started testing a multinational bank’s new web-based platform at two of its 70 subsidiaries for two years. They later migrated all export financing, roughly 10,000 transactions annually, to Netherlands-based ABN Amro’s MaxTrad, an online platform for trade financing. Users can go online and initiate purchase orders and track financing through payment assurance, fulfillment, compliance and settlement. DuPont has been pleased with the results. A financing cycle that took 45 to 90 days has been trimmed by an average of six days. Forwarders, who were notoriously prone to errors in typed documentation, are no longer making mistakes on the web forms they’re accessing through a simple Internet connection. In the past, the slightest misspelling of a name would hold up delivery until DuPont’s export credit managers could speak with banks and then call the customs agency to OK release of the goods. According to DuPont, they are getting their money quicker.

(Source: The Journal of Commerce)