DE LA CRUZ: Does the Central Bank still enforce Memorandum 269 which sets some requirements before you can offer online banking?

ESCUCHA: Yes, you have to go through a series of presentations to satisfy the Central Bank. They have a team of certified IT supervision people whose main concern is to make sure that your security -- the software, hardware at the procedures level -- is in place before they give you the license. That's their highest priority. Getting a license is a very complex process as far as the Central Bank is concerned and it took us months to get that.

DIAZ: I've been on the lookout for gateway facilities (that can handle payment transactions for a regional phase order-processing system). For example I have a new customer coming from Azerbaijan who wants me to deliver 42 containers of banana to Azerbaijan. We consummate the deal online and all I need to do is get his bank to deposit to my bank through a gateway facility that will allow the process. Unfortunately, the banking process we have is taking some time and there's no available facility that simply allows you to get approval and get the money across right away.

ESCUCHA: That's an excellent point. Actually, the retail part of our offering is only phase one. We have something for corporate and we have a cash management back-end that will enable B2B.

DIAZ: Don't worry you're not late. We have a regional cash management project of almost two years ago where we wanted to consolidate all our banks throughout the region and at the same time be able to manage all these banks with user accounts. We have not made the decision which bank to choose because they all still lack the applications.