Western Union

Western Union (WU) as the globally recognized leader in global money movement and payment services. Structure and activities of the organization. Market structure and WU’s market positioning. Employees’ performance measurement. Sales support department.

Рубрика Банковское, биржевое дело и страхование
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Язык английский
Дата добавления 23.01.2015
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Plekhanov Russian Economics University

International Business School

Placement Report

Western Union

Student:

Kristina Khoang

IBS-P Supervisor:

Shirochenskaya I.P.

Moscow 2014

Structure and Activities of the Organization

The Company. Western Union (WU) is the globally recognized leader in global money movement and payment services, providing people and businesses with fast, reliable and convenient ways to send money and make payments around the world.

The company started its history in 1851 when `New York and Mississippi Valley Printing Telegraph Company' appeared. Five years later, some western American telegraph companies decided to make an alliance and named it `Western Union'. The first domestic money transfer occurred in 1871 and in a quarter of century later the service became available in Europe, South Africa, North and South America, Australia and Asia. The first international money transaction was done in 1989. On the Russian market the brand exists since 1991 and 2 years ago celebrated its 160 years anniversary.

Nowadays, WU is a worldwide leader organization with head offices all around the world and it operates in more than 200 countries and territories with approximately 90% of these locations outside of the United States.

Legal Structure. The company is operating in Russia as Western Union Payment System registered with CBR and represented by Western Union Money Transaction East (Russian non-banking credit organization) as 100% affiliate of WU group. The head office was initially located in Denver, USA. Within the times, each region organized their own head offices (Europe and CIS, Asia Pacific, North and South America, Middle East and Africa) with many sub offices in many regions.

Nature of the Business. As people move and travel around the world, they are able to use the services of the well-recognized brand to transfer funds. Western Union promotes global economic opportunity and growth by bridging gaps in the financial services sector. The growing product portfolio includes business solutions, consumer-to-consumer money transfer, bill payment services, and stored value options such as prepaid cards. Online, by phone, from 115k ATMs and through more than 515k agent locations worldwide, Western Union aims to move money anytime, anywhere and anyway the customers choose, helping consumers and businesses grow.The brand is highly recognized by people and it is considered to be one of the most safety and reliable methods of sending money internationally and across any country. In 2012, Western Union completed 231 million consumer-to-consumer transactions worldwide, moving $79 billion of principal between consumers, and 432 million business payments.

Service Description. The main WU product is Money Transfer (MT) service which is available all around the world. It is possible to send money between countries in 120 different currencies without request of the receiver's location address. Western Union moves money along more than 16 000 corridors.

WU offers a variety of ways for customers to send or receive money depending on whether they are making a transfer in person, by phone or online using a credit or debit card. This includes Money in Minutes, Next Day, Three Day and Home Delivery services. Money also can be sent to a bank account or loaded to a stored-value or prepaid card. The average transaction quantity is 28 transactions per second.

There are three service segments: Consumer-to-Consumer, Consumer-to-Business and Business Solutions. Each of our three segments addresses a different combination of consumer groups, distribution networks and services offered.

1. Consumer-to-Consumer.

Individual money transfers from one consumer to another are the core of the company's business, representing 81% of total consolidated revenues for 2012. Consumer-to-Consumer money transfer service enables people to send money around the world, usually within minutes (the Next Day delivery service gives consumers a lower-priced option for money transfers that do not need to be received within minutes, while still offering the convenience, reliability and ease of use that the consumers expect). The segment includes six regions whose functions are limited to generating, managing and maintaining agent relationships and localized marketing activities. The revenue in this segment is derived primarily from transaction fees charged to consumers to transfer money. In money transfers involving different send and receive currencies, WU also generates revenue based on the difference between the exchange rate set by WU to the consumer and the rate at which they or their agents are able to acquire the currency. WU generally pays agents a commission based on a percentage of revenue. A commission is usually paid to both `send agent' (agent that initiated the transaction) and' receive agent' (agent that paid the transaction).

In a typical money transfer transaction, a consumer goes to one of the agent locations, completes a form specifying the name and address of the recipient (some other information can be requested), and give it back, along with the principal amount of the money transfer and the fee paid to the agent. This process is streamlined for WU customers who use the loyalty card. The initial loyalty program called Gold!Card was available in approximately 80 countries and territories and had approximately 19 million active participants by the end of 2012. Over 40% of Western Union branded Consumer-to-Consumer transactions are initiated by the loyalty program participants. Nowadays, WU runs new myWU loyalty program which makes the process of transferring money more quickly and easier for both customers and operators. It comes in a form of card which keeps sender's information and all the data about previous transaction and receivers. In Russia this LP is currently on development stage. It is assumed that in future clients will be able to accumulate points and change them on fee discounts and gifts.

Consumer-to-Consumer services:

· Walk-in and telephone money transfer services (when cash is collected by the agent and payment and is available for pick-up at another agent location)

· Online money transfer service (to send funds online, generally using a credit or debit card, for pay-out at most Western Union branded agent locations)

· Account based money transfer service (to use bank account, bank's Internet or ATM banking service to initiate money transfer electronically, without visit a physical Western Union agent location)

· Direct to bank (to send a transaction from an agent location directly to a bank account in certain countries)

· Mobile money transfer service (ability to transfer money to a mobile wallet or bank account)

2. Consumer-to-Business

Consumer-to-Business segment represented 11% of total consolidated revenues for 2012, WU provides fast and convenient options to make one-time or recurring payments from consumers to businesses and other organizations, including utilities, auto finance companies, mortgage servicers, financial service providers, government agencies and other businesses.

The consumer payments fees are typically less than the fees charged in Consumer-to-Consumer segment. Consumers may make cash payment at an agent or owned location or may make an electronic payment over the phone or on the Internet using their credit or debit card, through the automated clearing house (“ACH”) system, or via a wire transfer.

Consumer-to-Business services:

· Western Union Payments (to send funds to businesses and government agencies, primarily across the United States and Canada, using cash and debit card)

· Speedpay (United States; to make payments to a variety of businesses using credit cards, debit cards, ACH and checks; payments are initiated over the phone or the Internet)

· Equity Accelerator (to makes mortgage payments by ACH)

· Pago Fбcil (South America, Argentina; walk-in, cash bill payment services which allow consumers to make payments for services such as phone, utilities and other recurring bills)

3. Business Solutions.

The business-to-business payments industry has evolved with technological innovations that have created new methods of processing payments from businesses to other businesses. This segment facilitates payment and foreign exchange solutions, primarily cross-border, cross-currency transactions, for small and medium size enterprises and other organizations and individuals.

The business payment services are primarily offered over the phone, through partner channels, and via the Internet. Business Solutions services are available in 30 countries and have relationships with approximately 100k customers. The cross-border payments industry is expected to expand in the future due to the expanding global focus of many businesses.

Management structure WU. WU activity is divided into 4 regions: Europe/CIS, Asia Pacific, South/North America, Middle East/Africa. Region EE (Eastern Europe) and CIS include Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belorussia, Bosnia Herzegovina, Croatia, Cyprus, Georgia, Israel, Kazakhstan, Kirgizstan, Kosovo, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Russia, Serbia, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan. Among sub-region leaders: for West CIS & Israel- Kiev; for Southeast Europe- Istanbul; for Central Asia & Azerbaijan- Tashkent.

The Moscow office is controlled by Regional Vice-President (EE and CIS) which is also influenced by some internal control. Departments in Moscow office: Sales Department (searches for new WU locations in banks and retail networks); Business Development (develops and signs contracts with new agents); Independent (Sales Support) Department (consists of many regional managers who sign and support different agents in their locations of responsibility (Russian cities and regions); Marketing Department (planning/strategy, market segments, research, creativity, pricing, promotion); Operations (projects planning and implementation); Finance Department ( business initiatives support, bank accounts opening); Credit and Collection Department (limits management, guaranty payment attraction, credit risk minimization); Finance Monitoring Department (risk assessment of new services and operations); Legal Department (contract and agreement legal expertise, support and development); IT (Server infrastructure update, hardware refresh, regional and global IT infrastructure optimization and support); Application Development; Networking and Telecommunications Department; Customer Care Department; HR Department; Administration Team.

Staff. WU Company consists of 9,000 passionate and hard-working employees and approximately 1,000,000 Agent front line associates. The Moscow office has about 150 employees including regional managers all around Russia.

Revenue

2010

2011

2012

WU Revenue, m$

5,192.7

5,491.4

5,664.8

western union money payment

Mission/Vision. Western Union goal is to make customers' lives a little better and meet their needs with a variety of products and services. Western Union has a history of adapting business to meet the changing needs of the people. Western Union leaders understand and adapt to customers' evolving needs while remaining true to their values. So, as more of the consumers continue moving to more places around the world, the agent relationships have never been more important. The agents' deep understanding of the communities they serve comes from the fact that they live in these communities themselves and their long tenure with Western Union gives them the knowledge and insight to create customized solutions on a local basis. The global team is inspired and motivated by the stories of their customers and the extraordinary impact of the money sent regarding their relatives and relationships.

Innovation, trust and convenience remain the hallmark of the business as Western Union is positioned to compete in a fast-growing global market. WU also strives to educate consumers on safeguarding transactions and personal information, and avoiding fraud when using Western Union services.

WU believes that brand's strength, size and reach of global network have been important to the growth of the business and the company continues to meet the needs of customers for fast, reliable and convenient global money movement and payment services.

Strategic objectives. WU is working to enhance their services and provide their consumer and business clients with access to an expanding portfolio of payment and other financial services and to expand the number of channels available to access these services. The business solutions is increasing product offerings for small businesses, exporters, educational institutions and non-governmental organizations, enabling international commerce with personalized customer service, innovation and expertise.

WU is implementing pricing investments to enhance value proposition; they are working to add agent locations, expanding in Europe, Latin America and Asia, and paving the way to formalize money transfer services in newly opened markets.

WU is increasing investments in high-growth electronic channels to build a world-class customer experience. These efforts are paying off in rapid growth in digital, account based money transfer, and mobile. Online westernunion.com money transfer transactions grew more than 40% in 2012, while transactions for electronic account based money transfer through banks surged more than 50%.

The WU strategy for next years is to continue the transition with a clear focus on returning the business to stronger revenue and profit growth. The key initiatives include strengthening consumer money transfer, driving customer growth and usage of Western Union, and generating and deploying strong cash flow for shareholders.

Market Structure and WU's Market Positioning. Despite the money transaction market in Russia is already saturated with competitors, movement of money is a growing tendency all around the world. According to CBR statistics, in the third quarter of 2013, 245m$ and 805m$ from Far Abroad and CIS respectively were transferred into Russia through money transaction services, and 731m$ and 6476m$ from Russia to the same directions. The general turnover during this period makes 8257m$. In some areas of this business Russia surpass other countries. Russia is the second largest cross-border, consumer-to-consumer money transaction market globally. WU has the highest number of locations in comparison with competitors. WU has more than 17k locations in Russia and about 38k in CIS.

In every country where WU has locations, different strategies and local programs are developed according to the regions. The main goal for Western Union is to be convenient for customer and offer a variety ways how to execute money transfer (MT). Usually the locations are chosen on `visible' areas on a way to home or job. WU is increasing the number of locations in retail and banks, paying more attention to the latter. As new technologies enter into business and people are willing to use them, thus another goal for WU is to increase the number of online money transfer channels and methods of money transaction through Internet, ATM, SST and mobile banking.

The offered service price is assumed to be fair, competitive and meets customer's expectations. WU look how well the customers are served, whether there is anything else that can be introduced to people so that they can feel WU's service more special and valuable than competitors'. When it comes to partners, WU strives to make transaction process better and faster and productivity of agents higher due to proper supply of tools and equipments. These strategies are both global and local for the company.

WU takes part in charity and social events directed on people's life improvement since 2001. There is a special organization `WU Foundation' which donated more than 80m$ on social development and charity programs in 120 countries.

Competition. There are nineteen competitors on Russian market which offer money transaction services. Among them are: Anelik, BLIZKO, Coinstar Money Transfer, Contact, InterExpress, Migom, MoneyGram, PrivatMoney, UNIStream, Western Union, Azia Express, Allure, Blits, Bystraya Pochta, Zolotaya Korona, Leader, Pochta Rossii, Faster, Caspian Money Transfer.

Experts assume that competition in terms of tariffs is not relevant any longer due to recently established maximum decreased rates. Systems have to apply marketing tools and mechanisms to retain market share. To attract new consumer segments, MT systems invest a lot in innovations, broaden product portfolio, develop self networks and contract new partner agreements. Systems which only copy each other and do not integrate anything new leave the market.

The main aims for MT systems are to spread geographically, gain market share in main corridors, strengthen networks in biggest send and receive countries and supply consumers with convenient locations.

Despite traditional MT methods, there are more sophisticated technologies based on Internet, card-to-card or cash-to-card. However, they are not thought to be competitors to MT systems due to diversify target audience with different preferences.

Customers.

Senders across Russia and to Far Abroad:

· 56% women, 44% men

· Age: 35-64 (the biggest age group is 55-64 (28%))

· 94% RF citizens

· 84% send money to other family members

· Middle and high income

· Employment: office workers, business owners, house wives

Senders to CIS:

· 50% women, 50% men

· Age: 18-54

· 71% migrants

· Send money for family support in homeland

· Urgent/unnecessary money transfers

· Money transfers as gifts (holidays)

· Low income

· Employment: building, trade

Segment 1

Continues to be a WU priority

Segment 2

Focus and WU priority

Segment 3

Focus and WU priority

Method

Preference for traditional cash money transfer (also other methods)

Preference for traditional cash MT as well as new methods or channels

Preference for convenient MT such as retail, kiosks, ABMT, on-line

Corridors

Russia to Central Asia

Ukraine, Moldova, Belarus, Georgia, Azerbaijan

Intra, China, USA, Germany

Demographics

· Blue collar immigrant

· Employed in construction, lower-skilled services,

· Far from being integrated into the economic mainstream of their host country. Potentially under banked.

· Family banked back home. Come from countries with poor or unstable banking industry (Central Asia).

· Immigrant, but a bit more upscale than the current WU core demographic

· More established, integrated into mainstream lifestyle, Russian speaking

· Higher skilled. Likely white collar employment, retail, services, housekeeping

· Banked in their host country

· Family banked back home. Likely to come from a source country with a well-established banking industry (Ukraine, Moldova, Belarus, Georgia)

· Native born senders across Russia, CIS and internationally

· Most of them are females (70%)

· Belong to middle social class or doing small business (services, small retail or wholesale)

· Banked in their country (65%)

· The receivers are banked as well

Needs and Behavior

· Highly price sensitive

· Language dependent, risk averse

· WOM and agents of influence are most reliable channels to communicate to them

· High brand awareness of WU cash MT, likely tried already for at least SOME of their money transfer needs…

· MT occasions: regular support, special dates, emergency

· Easy to switch to cheaper services

· Very familiar with WU brand

· Has probably used WU at some point in the past, and may still use WU occasionally

· Prefers an easy and convenient experience. Defines convenience as “I can do it everywhere - on the street, in a supermarket, at the small retail store, at home”

· Likely higher-principal sends

· Preference for traditional cash MT as well as new methods or channels

· Few mainstream consumers sending cross border, but many with domestic needs

· Relatively low awareness and usage of WU brand

· More diversity in the MT's reasons (gifting, emergencies, travel) with support reasons not being predominant

· More sensitive to convenience/channel choice/service experience than WU core current users

· Middle to high principle senders

Employees' performance measurement. WU Behavior Code for Employees consists of 5 main qualities: Inspired, Connected, Driven, Game-Changer, and Responsible. Each point has several assumptions which each worker should follow or be able to reach. For this goal, a special global employee program `Bravo' was created in order to support the philosophy of recognizing and rewarding employees to achieve results by demonstrating WU Behaviors. There are four unique recognitions: Peer-to-Peer (give or receive recognition from colleagues), Manager Discretionary (managers recognizing employees), On-the-Spot (by senior leadership for exceptional performance) and Service Anniversary (employment milestones). Award points allow selecting awards from a wide array of merchandise available from online catalogue. This program works to motivate colleagues and drive performance.

A Performance Rating Scale ranks from 1 to 5 from `not missed' to `far exceeds' expectations. There are two ways of rating employees: on objectives and WU Behaviors. Statistics shows that the average employees' assessment is `3' which means `fully meets expectations': the employee fully meets responsibilities and objectives set, delivers expected results; viewed as valid and solid contributors; if all employees work in a similar way, the organization would be competent in this area.

Personal Reflection and Evaluation of Placement

My placement in Western Union can be divided into two parts due to working in two different departments: Sales Support and Marketing. The placement period lasted from 2nd of September till 28th of December 2013. I have been working in Sales Support Department (SS) during the first month of my employment in the company. My further practice continued in Marketing Department. Let me introduce some details about both departments and my duties, responsibilities and skills I have used and gained.

Sales Support Department.

The main function of this department is to create and build efficient network chain of active agents on a certain territories (retail locations only (shops, markets, mobile retails, different service locations, etc.), not banks). By the end of 2013, the total number of independent WU retail locations show 1650 with a revenue of 1,2m$. Geography of this project is widely spread and contains 15 cities of Russia and close locations. The territory is divided between 3 regional managers (STSEs) and WU locations in each city are controlled by different sub-regional managers (TSEs).

Despite of searching new WU locations, the aim of these managers is to develop and increase the effectiveness of business of each existing location, and to manage the revenue and income on advocated territory. The main stages in their operations are analysis, planning, realization and reporting to the Moscow office, while the main goals are to sign contracts with new partners, activate locations, develop these locations and keep reports updated.

All the managers' activities are controlled and supported by Sales Support Department in Moscow. It consists of several Sales Support Specialists who are responsible for own Russian regions and all of them have the same duties and responsibilities.

This department is relatively new in comparison with others (was opened in 2012). Its necessity was supported with increasing quantity of WU locations in retail chains. As business cannot be managed and controlled in banks and retail WU locations in the same way, the company decided to acquire specialists who will keep in touch with regional managers and retail locations would be better structured and more properly managed and controlled.

Every following step of new WU agent's activation can be done only after approval from the department. Firstly, manager comes to location (`cold visit') and presents WU's services, after the agreement is signed, SS make a pre-check of main documents. If all the documents are correct, the contract is send to Settlement&Compliance Department. After the full document package is ready and correct, Sales Support enters new agent in all databases, supply it with all necessary equipments to be able to make money transactions, ask Compliance to educate the staff and the agent is activated.

Sales Support Department usually has the same process of new agent activations and report updates. On every step Sales Support interacts with other departments for checking and agreements, and overseas offices. All the reports are daily and weekly updated (they contain information about activations, locations, transaction etc.), information about daily activities of TSEs must be send by them strictly by deadlines; every Friday there must be a plan for the following week.

During the first week on my new job I had to understand the functions and duties of the department and how it relies to the other departments in the company. I was given many presentations about WU Company and its main services, further with explanations and instructions of Sales Support regarding their responsibilities, communication processes and data reporting. The employees of Sales Support are the first people in this department and their team has never changed before I came. They faced some difficulties to explain me the duties and responsibilities of their job in the company. Luckily, there are several presentations for new regional managers in which all the processes of documentation and reports are precisely described.

It is always important to show yourself as a hardworking and diligent employee in the first working days and keep this image as long as possible. I tried to memorize everything quickly but it was not easy as Sales Support job was mainly connected with long algorithms of agents' registration and its further management. This type of job needs experience first, after what you usually get full understanding of situation and later try to improve your skills.

WU is a perfect example of worldwide brand which has many offices in many countries and they all have to keep in touch on phone or mail. All the business events, conversations, mails and reports in the company must be held in English language.

In my duties was included working with important documents and contracts: its composition, sending them to managers and agents for signing, checking, sending to the other departments, keeping them in online and offline archives and updating these papers if necessary. All the information was stored in computerized database programs like Paradox, Midgaard, Diasoft and SalesForce. It took time to get fully acquired with these programs; they contain locations and owners' data, agents' status, quantity of transactions etc. Most of the databases must be updated daily or weekly by hand and on time. Before I faced such tasks, I have never dialed with any complex computer databases. As many companies use such programs for data storage nowadays, it is very skillful to know how to work with them.

There were also special reports requests for me from colleagues and managers where I applied my skills of presenting relevant and concise data in a logical and structured way in Excel or PPP. This tasks from managers needed long analysis of a lot of information from existing quantitative reports and collecting of primary data. Usually these data was gathered through calls to regional managers or agent locations. It could be just simple acquiring of information or mystery calls to check the availability or quality of WU services in some locations. Here I had to use my communication skills in different situations. In the beginning I felt myself a bit confused as it was hard to follow some conversation but within time I heard how other employees answer these calls and gained needed experience.

While working with new location activation, I had to keep in touch with other departments of the company not only with local but also foreign offices. I had to remember well others' duties and whom I should ask various questions and requests. It was also good practice of English as most of the communication was done with USA office in Denver.

By the end of September, I was assigned to conduct an introduction presentation and two training programs for new regional managers where I explained them some new changes in their activities and processes which were introduced first in Q3 of 2013 and analyzed several WU cases which were connected with their responsibilities. It was my first experience in real life when I made such presentations where I taught people new things rather than discussed or presented some secondary theoretical information as I usually did in university. I felt so much responsibility because how well and correctly I explained influenced further managers' activities and understanding of up-to-dated situation.

In a couple of weeks after my placement has started I already had good understanding of company's structure and Sales Support Department responsibilities and activities. Nevertheless, the office has about 150 people, I became acquainted with most of them in a short period of time due to frequent job meetings, international townhalls, and numerous gathering in kitchen to celebrate holidays and mini events.

WU operates worldwide in `American style'. What I mean is the open atmosphere in relationships and conversations between any status of employees, cooperativity (when people are keeping well in teams, trust each other, actively introduce their ideas) or friendly communication style which is rather informal than formal (with reasonable limits for sure). These things let me dispel the myths that working in office can be just boring; what is more, my colleagues were always happy to help me with some tasks or advice.

My last days in Sales Support Department I spent ordering WU marketing products for all the Russian cities where WU operates and sent them to regional managers to use in their locations. This was the first time I appeared in Marketing Department and later I was offered to continue practice there, after what I finally moved to this department.

Marketing Department.

Marketing Department in WU Moscow office is responsible for all marketing activities on the territory of Russia and CIS countries. Despite being a big company with high number of staff, all the duties in marketing are divided among just three Marketing Managers. Their job is related to all 4Ps and other marketing issues: planning and strategy for Russia and CIS, pricing, promotion, production of advertising materials for online and real WU locations and partners' support, market segmentation analysis, corridors analysis, surveys etc. As any other department, WU has to keep its reports updated.

During 2013, WU Marketing Team Russia interviewed more than 200 clients, carried out two important researches and held 15 focus groups, placed advertising on all WU locations and 500 transports, introduced 2 hours of advertising on radio, spread 226k leaflets, sent 7m SMS/MMS, and contacted directly to half a million of people.

The first days in new department I had to spend for analyzing what is going on in WU Marketing Department. I was introduced to all marketing employees; they are real professionals with great experience and good specialists in this business.

Since the competition of money transaction (MT) market has significantly increased in the last few years due to entrance of many Russian competitors which offer lower price MT service with quality sometimes not worse than WU's. I have read many survey results and competition analysis of MT business, which gave me a much greater insight of MT market and understanding of WU's market position among competitors. These surveys were ordered by WU in popular marketing research agencies. The reports contain data about competitors' countries of operation, pricing, location and client figures, some financial data and operational and service peculiarities. Furthermore, I should not have forgotten about other MT methods which are also some kind of competition for WU and MT market in general.

To gain some quantitative data I analyzed some statistics on Central Bank Russia website which introduce annual and quarter money inflow and outflow figures to and from the country, money amount circulations between Russia and abroad which are sent only through MT companies. To start to work I also needed to have well understanding of least and most popular corridors of money transaction between countries. The process of searching for this information, memorizing the main aspects and building in mind the general picture of the market structure and companies' needs and goals was totally different from what I used to do in Sales Support Department.

For the first two weeks I was given tasks by managers to find some secondary data about competitors in the Internet in order to help to make market research presentation with comparison of WU and other companies. Further tasks were individual, most of them were connected with competitors where I analyzed main KPIs such as corridors' market share, inbound and outbound transaction volumes, average transaction amount, number of locations, migration processes etc. Most of the reports and collected data I presented were in Excel tables and it was important to present it in proper way with high visibility and easy structure. While having done such reports, I had to understand that this file would be available in WU internal database for other employees as already secondary information or for further update. Gathering and analyzing such information always takes a lot of time as the data must be the latest but sometimes it is impossible to find everything you need just in Internet or by mystery calls, however usage of some external data can be acquired from other sources or departments.

In Q2 of 2013 Western Union introduced new pricing for their services, so I did some reports on comparison of prices in bank and retail locations of WU and its competitors when MT are sent and received in cash. As WU has a wide range of product portfolio which means that people can send money in cash, online, through self-service terminals and ATMs, by cards etc. In 2014 WU is going to introduce D2B (Direct2Bank) service in Russia which makes it possible to make MTs in cash which the receiver can get directly on his bank account (available from Russia to 45 CIS and FA countries). This time my task was to make up the text which WU would place on the website and form a brochure and poster for the new service. I took some of American and British text and style as an example and made good proper translation. This task was more creative in comparison with previous ones, so I could show my creativity in marketing concept.

Promotion is very important in such competitive market and every MT brand offers many seasonal or holiday discounts, promos and lotteries. However, every promo should be evaluated after it finishes in order to understand whether it was profitable and attracted more customers or not. I had a task to collect the results of two promo campaigns which took place in Georgia and Moldova in summer 2013: new tariffs were introduced and some events were organized in cities to attract new customers and increase existing customers' loyalty. By the way, results show positive figures in profits and increased amount of transaction in comparison with previous months.

WU runs loyalty program (LP) called myWU. To become a member of this program, a customer has to make the first money transfer and fill in personal data or register on the website. After registration he gets own personal code which can be used for further money transactions. Actually, myWU cannot be called as LP yet as by now it is just a card (or just number) which contains customer information (no any discounts or promos are introduced yet). To make it work, WU needs to develop the program and make it real LP. I analyzed the LP structure and its kinds and proposed some ideas in a form of presentation. I introduced full description of competitors' LPs and other popular LP existing in Russia in banking and retail sector, worked out most proper strategy and important issues to consider when developing myWU, offered possible next steps to develop the program, how to advertise and promote it properly and gave some useful tips to make the program more effective and attractive.

After numerous readings about focus groups, I finally had a real experience to see how these deep interviews take place. WU used service of CESSI agency (Institute of Comparison of Social Research) and conducted five different focus groups with different groups of people. The groups were chosen due to countries depending on where they send money (most popular corridors were chosen) and for which reason. All the groups were absolutely different; they did not know that the interview was ordered by WU. The subject for research was to find out how people's attitude to different money transfer systems. I found the interviewer's questions very interesting and I liked how she led discussion from one topic to another to reveal participants' real feelings and thoughts.

Summary

Previously I have been working in small or medium Russian companies, but this placement in Western Union gave me a deeper insight of how a global company can operate in reality. I had a great opportunity to get experience in two absolutely different departments during not very long employment period. I have always tried to do my best in every piece of job, show myself in discussions, and support good relationship with colleagues. I did it not for further promotion but to understand for myself my desire and ability to work, apply my skills and knowledge I have learned before while studying, and, for sure, gain new experience. Working in Sales Support and in Marketing Departments was very different in terms of my duties and responsibilities, tasks I was given to accomplish, nature of business and processes of activities.

In Sales Support the job was more structured with planned directions and steps, in most cases it was repeated processes of new location registration or report updates. From the very beginning, this job position seemed to be a lit boring, plus I was nervous the first few days as I wanted to show colleagues my best qualities and was worried whether I will be able to accomplish my duties well. The job related a lot with working on computer, thus I gained some new technological skills and knowledge. I worked in a good friendly team who supported me. After I have shown all my efforts, communication skills and responsibility quality, they let me experience more than just everyday computer job.

Being employed in Marketing Department was my initial goal when I came to the company, as I wanted to get experience in this sphere and understand whether it is the field I want to work with in future. As the department had only several employees, there has always been a lot of job to accomplish. Usually I had a choice which task to do; sometimes some of them were in higher priority and must have been ready by specified deadlines. I always tried to choose tasks from different marketing issues such as pricing, promos, competition, NPD, loyalty programs etc. After accomplishment of every task I presented the results to colleagues to who it may concern. It was important not only to present the data in logical and visible way, but there is a high responsibility whether this data is correct and up-to-dated.

From the placement in Western Union I have gained not only useful unforgettable experience, but also positive emotions and got new contacts. I am happy that I had this opportunity and would like to continue working there or in a similar international organization one day. During my employment in WU I have followed many business and management processes in international company with a unique atmosphere.

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