By investing in new systems and processes, many corporates have already been able to significantly increase the efficiency of their payments and cash management. However, the administration of bank accounts and the corresponding authorisations often remains very time-consuming and labour-intensive. Even the agreements on bank conditions and the checking of bank statements are still time-consuming "manual labour" for many corporates. For some time now, individual banks have been offering technical solutions in the form of Application Programmable Interfaces (APIs). However, these are often not yet an ideal solution due to high costs and a lack of standardisation.

Standardisation of formats and channels 

An alternative is to use international, multi-bank standards that have already been developed for end-to-end electronic business processes between customer and bank.

In conjunction with modern solutions for electronic bank account management (eBAM) and bank fee management (BSB - Bank Services Billing), these standards offer many advantages: they reduce manual tasks and directly relieve the treasury; they significantly accelerate all processes and create group-wide transparency. Standards such as ISO20022-XML and EBICS enable banks in the DACH region and in France, which already support them, to utilise the offer at in a cost-effective way. Multibank capability allows new banks, accounts and employees to be onboarded as and when needed.

eBAM and BSB concepts based on these technical standards have already been implemented in several countries as part of pilot projects with internationally active transaction banks and corporate customers as a sector-independent solution: for the entire account lifecycle from opening to closing an account, including the exchange of digitalised KYC documents and the control of bank charges.

At the centre of the projects is always a uniform platform that can be used to centrally manage all banks, accounts, conditions and authorisations down to the level of EBICS authorisations for individual order types and limits. This means that Treasury has an overview of all accounts and can immediately see which employees are authorised to access which accounts with which amounts and who is authorised for certain banking transactions and how. It also makes it easy to fulfil all the current transparency and control requirements of the auditors.

Key implementation drivers

All corporates benefit from the ability to implement and monitor account management for all branches and subsidiaries centrally and electronically in a standard digital process. The benefits are particularly great for internationally active corporates and corporates with complex accounts and authorisation structures. The manual effort involved in setting up and closing accounts and managing authorisations is no longer necessary; sources of error are eliminated. Data can be sent electronically when communicating with banks. Centralised document and transaction management for all authorised signatories, bank contracts, accounts and corporates, including audit-proof logging, ensures transparency and legal certainty. Detailed evaluation and comparison options and the automated control of settled bank charges promote the degree of digitalisation in treasury and reduce the workload of accounting.

Step by step to successful implementation

So how does a corporate treasurer approach such a project?

1. The first step is to keep the status quo in mind. Many corporates have stored relevant information in the form of digital or even printed copies of documents. The associated internal and external workflows are written down as part of treasury governance, but not digitised. Based on the inventory, it should be analysed which processes are suitable for digitisation and which systems can be used to improve the situation. Consultancy firms and/or solution providers can provide support in defining the target process if necessary..
    
2. The second step is to select a suitable solution with which the existing processes can be optimised. It should be noted that account opening processes are often structured across departments, but at the same time must be monitored centrally by the treasury department. All necessary information and documents should therefore be securely stored in a central repository and displayed at the touch of a button. Clear reports and analyses of account authorisations and bank charges are a further criterion. With just a few clicks, it should be possible to initiate changes to authorisations or persons across all banks and accounts and communicate them to the bank partners. To achieve this, it is important that future-proof interfaces and formats are supported for a standardised end-2-end process.
    
3. Finally, the third step is to enter into dialogue with the banks. Depending on their own level of digitalisation and project progress, many banks already offer corresponding ISO 20022 XML formats such as acmt.nnn for eBAM or camt.086 for electronic bank fee billing via EBICS, SWIFT, Host-2-Host or API interface.

If these requirements are met, a digital eBAM and fee management system can be set up in a well-structured implementation process together with the account-holding banks.

Source: Treasury Bulletin of the Verband Deutscher Treasurer e.V. (Association of German Treasurers), Issue 01/2025