R E P R I N T E D F R O M T H E O M A H A W O R L D - H E R A L D

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At First Data’s new global command center in Omaha, employees monitor traffic and respond to problems in the 31 global payment systems that the company operates.

By Ross BoettcheR

WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER

Behind the scenes, a company with deep Omaha roots is power-ing the end-of-year shopping machine.

First Data wants to remain in the background, an invis-ible utility allowing purchases made with credit, debit or gift cards to move smoothly between consumer and merchant, said Jim Fisher, senior vice president of operations and technology for the Atlanta-based corporation.

Shoppers and businesses ex-pect quick and secure process-ing and approval of electronic payments, he said, much as people expect light when they flip an electrical switch or water when they turn the faucet.

When you swipe your card at the store, you expect it to work. Every time.

“When people head to the cash register they shouldn’t have to worry, ‘Is my card going to work?’ ” Fisher said. “It’s like water or electricity. That’s the approach we take. You swipe that card, the last thing you think about is that it’s not going through.”

Most electronic transactions — whether credit, debit or gift cards — take about a second, yet several steps occur between the swipe and the “transaction approved” message on the mer-chant’s reader:

» Information from the mag-netic strip on the back of the card goes to First Data.

» If First Data has authoriza-

tion from the card issuer to approve the transaction, First Data sends an OK to the mer-chant, giving the green light to continue with the sale.

» If First Data doesn’t have au-thorization to approve — a cus-tomer is over his or her credit limit, for example, or doesn’t have sufficient funds available — the information is passed to the card issuer, then back to First Data, then to the merchant to tell them if the transaction has been approved or denied.

Similar processes take place when consumers pay with per-sonal checks, but those transac-tions tend to take a bit longer, Fisher said.

According to First Data, retail dollar volumes were up 8.6 per-cent on Black Friday compared with last year. The average sale also increased, although only slightly by 1.1 percent.

The company ramps up for the holiday shopping boom by adding server space and bandwidth to its network. Some departments, such as customer service, hire temporary work-ers, Fisher said.

On one payment platform alone, First Data processed 43 million transactions on the Friday after Thanksgiving. That was the biggest daily total for that platform in the company’s 40-year history, said Nancy Etheredge, a company spokes-woman.

On a typical day, there are ap-proximately 31 million transac-tions on that same platform. That number is just a fraction of

the total transactions processed in a 24-hour period, Fisher said.

First Data has multiple “plat-forms,” which all accept differ-ent types of payments from dif-ferent types of businesses. For example, gas stations would all operate on a similar “platform,” as would comparable small retail shops or restaurants.

The record day on Nov. 26 translated to about 988 payment authorizations per second.

That number encompasses credit, debit and gift card trans-actions at the point of sale or online. It excludes other types of payment-related transactions such as address or credit-limit changes on accounts, Etheredge said.

According to a report released by First Data on Thursday, indi-cations are that the strong trans-action numbers for the day after Thanksgiving continued for the rest of the month, as well.

Total card spending, excluding automotive sales, was up 8.1 per-cent. Retail spending was up 8.5 percent, with sales at clothing and accessory stores growing 10.7 percent compared with the month last year, and mail and telephone orders gaining 10.6 percent. The only category that decreased was electronics and appliances, which had a 4.7 percent drawback.

In Omaha, First Data employs about 5,000 people in techni-cal support, customer service, finance and accounting, and the embossing, printing and mailing of cards.

First Data officials aren’t

merely being humble by saying the com-pany prefers to remain in the background. The main reason is security.

The company’s facilities are hypersecure to protect against breaches of the financial in-formation stored in its system. Many buildings, including a new global command center in Omaha, don’t even have signs indicating what they are.

At the new command center, each of the 310 employees passes through what are called “circle lock” doors.

First, he or she flashes a badge in front of a scanner. Then a door opens into a small, cylindri-cal glass holding area. There, a hand scan is conducted while an overhead camera takes a silhouette image of the person to ensure that only one individual entered and to check for any ab-normal items, such as large bags or containers, said Chris Kreps, director of command center operations.

To get a job in the command center, where employees monitor traffic and respond to problems in the 31 global pay-ment systems that First Data

operates, applicants must pass a “high-level” background check. The checks are so intense and so difficult to pass that First Data still hasn’t fully staffed the facility, which was completed in mid-November, he said.

“We’re one of the biggest companies nobody’s ever heard of. What we do here is more complicated than people would think.”

Fisher laughed when asked what would happen if First Data’s system failed or crashed between now and Christmas.

“That’ll never happen,” he said. “Volume is our friend. Bring the transactions on.”

Hear that, holiday shoppers? Sounds like a challenge.

Chris Kreps is director of command center operations. The command center was completed in mid-November.

43 million The number of transactions First Data processed on one payment platform on Nov. 26, the day after Thanksgiving.

31 millionThe number of transactions on a typical day on that same platform. That number is just a fraction of the total transactions processed in a 24-hour period, according to First Data.

988The number of payment authori-zations per second on Nov. 26, making it a record day.

BY THE NUMBERS

Holiday a rush for First DataPayment processing firm busily works behind the scenes for shoppers