Interim Management Statement
PayPoint plc
Interim Management Statement
The board reports on events, transactions and trading since the last financial
year end on 29 March 2010.
Bill and general payment transactions are in line with our expectations,
marginally up in the UK on the same period last year. In Romania, we have
processed more than 3 million bill payments, up over 200%. Retail services which
include ATMs, debit / credit card transactions, parcels and mobile phone SIM
card sales are up 23% on last year. Mobile top-ups continue to be adversely
affected by the operators offering more value for money to consumers.
Internet transactions increased to 16 million from 12 million in the same period
last year. We have successfully completed the migration of all our bureau
merchants to our new acquiring bank.
PayByPhone, our newly acquired business, is making investments as planned to
bring its operations up to PayPoint standards, in particular in sales and
marketing and disaster recovery. Â Transactions processed in the period were 4
million.
The National Lottery Commission (NLC) has announced that it is minded not to
permit Camelot's proposal for ancillary commercial services. The NLC has asked
for further comments by 17 September before it announces its final ruling.
Performance(1) for the period from 29 March 2010 to 25 July 2010(2) and
financial position(1) as at 25 July 2010
Transactions processed for the period were 176 million, up 6% compared to 166
million for the same period last year.
Net revenues(3) for the period were up 7% to £26 million as a result of the
acquisition of PayByPhone and growth in bill payment, internet, and retail
services, partially offset by the decline in mobile top-ups. Â The decline in
mobile top-ups has reduced revenues to £61 million, down 4% on the same period
as last year.
The total terminal estate at 25 July was 28,024, up 2% since the financial year
end. Â New installations of terminal sites in the UK and Ireland were a net 212.
In Romania, we have installed over 1,400 full service terminals and removed over
1,000 of the old, mobile top-up only terminals, giving a total estate of 5,169.
The remaining 850 old mobile top-up only terminals will be removed or replaced
with full service terminals.
Earnings before tax and interest for the period to 25 July are in line with
pro-rated market expectations, taking seasonality of trading and the acquisition
of PayByPhone into account.
The group has maintained a strong balance sheet. After the payment of the final
dividend of £10 million and £6 million for corporation tax, net cash as
expected, at 25 July, was £6 million (including client cash of £7 million),
compared to £15 million (including client cash of £7 million) at 28 March 2010.
1 Â PayPoint's auditors have not been requested to review the performance or
financial position
2 Â Comparative data is given for the similar 17 week period last year (i.e. 30
March to 26 July 2009)
3 Â Net revenue is revenue less commissions paid to retail agents, the cost of
mobile top-ups and SIM cards, where PayPoint is the principal and acquiring bank
charges
 Enquiries
Finsbury+44 207 251 3801
Rollo Head/Don Hunter
ABOUT PAYPOINT
PayPoint is a leading specialist payments company with operations in the UK,
Ireland, Romania, France, USA and Canada. We handle over £9.5 billion from over
550 million transactions annually for more than 6,000 clients and merchants.
PayPoint processes consumer payments across a wide variety of markets (energy
pre and post-payment, telecoms, housing, water, transport, e-commerce, parking
and gaming) through its retail networks, internet and mobile phone channels:
Retail networks
The PayPoint branded retail network in the UK numbers over 22,000 terminals
located in local shops (including Co-op, Spar, McColls, Costcutter, Sainsburys
Local, One Stop, Londis and thousands of independents) in all parts of the UK
and Ireland. Our terminals process energy meter prepayments, cash bill payments,
mobile phone top-ups, transport tickets, BBC TV licences and a wide variety of
other payment types for most leading utilities and many telecoms and consumer
service companies. Â We also supply added value services to our retailers to
improve the yield from our network. We have recently successfully launched a
consumer parcel drop off and collection service using PayPoint's retail network
through Collect+ a joint venture with Yodel (formerly Home Delivery Network
combined with it's recently acquired DHL businesses). This service is already
available in 3,000 of our convenience retailers. Clients include Littlewoods,
Woolworths, Very, Mobile Phone Exchange, Virgin Media and Great Universal. In
addition, in the UK we have over 2,000 LINK branded ATMs, mainly in the same
sites as our terminals. In Romania, the retail network numbers over 5,000
terminals located in local shops across Romania and is expanding. Our terminals
process cash bill payments for utilities and mobile phone top-ups. In Ireland,
we have over 500 outlets in shops and Credit Unions processing mobile top-ups
and bill payments.
Internet
PayPoint.net is an internet payment service provider linking into all major UK
acquiring banks to deliver secure online credit and debit card payments for over
5,000 web merchants, including PKR, Betsson, Moneysupermarket.com, Severn Trent
Water, Ann Summers and British Gas Home Vend. We offer a comprehensive set of
products ranging from a transaction gateway through to a bureau service, in
which we take the merchant credit risk and manage settlement for the merchants.
We offer real time reporting for merchant transactions and Fraudguard, an
advanced service to mitigate the risk of fraud for card not present
transactions.
PayByPhone
We recently acquired PayByPhone (Verrus Mobile Technologies Inc and Verrus UK
Limited). PayByPhone is a leading international provider of services to parking
authorities allowing consumers to use their mobile phones to pay for their
parking by credit or debit card. It has contracts in the UK, Canada, USA and
France. Â PayPoint is widely recognised for its leadership in prepayment systems,
smart technology and consumer service. Our high quality services are backed by a
24/7 operations centre with dual site processing for business continuity.
To give competitive differentiation, we aim to meet our clients' payment needs,
not just through a wide spectrum of payments, but also with products that span
payment channels. For example, PayCash enables cash payment for internet
transactions at PayPoint retailers and our new home vending solutions allow
customers to pay across the internet as well as through our retail network.
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Source: Paypoint plc via Thomson Reuters ONE