Transaction Trends

ETA has recognized three companies with the payments industry’s highest honor, the 2021 ETA Star Awards – Response to COVID-19, presented at the ETA Strategic Leadership Forum. This year’s winners are Celero Commerce, Homebase, and NCR Corporation.

The 2021 ETA Star Award — Response to COVID-19 was created to acknowledge the important work of the payments and fintech industry in keeping commerce running and going the extra mile for their customers and employees in response to the pandemic. The winners were judged and selected by the ETA Awards & Recognition Committee, composed of a panel of industry executives of ETA member companies.

The following is a detailed account of NCR’s award-winning activities in response to the pandemic.

Q. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the world halted, but NCR kept moving.
A. The company understood that its customers and employees played a vital role in providing essential services worldwide. To protect the financial health of NCR, its 36,000 worldwide employees and thousands of customers who depended upon the company’s products and services to sustain business, the company immediately established a global COVID-19 Response Task Force, which devised an action plan and launched #KeepCommerceRunning, a rallying cry for meeting the pandemic head on. NCR also created a digital hub on NCR.com, where customers and communities could access pandemic-related resources.

Q. How did NCR #KeepCommerceRunning to prioritize the safety of your employees and customers, while maintaining business continuity?
A. #KeepCommerceRunning efforts involved fact-driven decision-making and the development of pandemic operating guidelines, based on guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization. The task force also employed crisis-response communication strategies that included active listening and transparency, and it created employee playbooks for working at home. #KeepCommerceRunning provided a unifying message for addressing four areas of concern — employee safety, customer safety, business continuity, and clarity of expectations between NCR and its employees.

Q. How did NCR employees and customers engage and participate in the campaign? Can you share any particular story that was powerful?
A. With information ranging from how to apply for a Paycheck Protection Program loan to how to establish a digital-first restaurant, NCR’s newly created hub proved a vital resource for customers. The company also shared a variety of stories supplied by customers and employees to showcase innovative ways that businesses throughout the country were working to #KeepCommerceRunning. One example featured craft brewers in Nebraska, who faced substantial revenue declines due to not being able to serve their customers in person. In response, the brewers devised a gift card marketing program in conjunction with a local equipment supplier that was willing to match gift card purchases made by the brewers’ customers.

That effort eased cash flow difficulties and enhanced the relationships between the equipment supplier, the brewers, and customers. Sharing that story online enabled other NCR customers to recognize how gift card marketing efforts could offset the sudden revenue declines they were experiencing.

Q. How did you keep employees engaged as you transformed internal operations in response to pandemic conditions?
A. One of the most critical elements of #KeepCommerceRunning was to help NCR employees protect themselves and their families, particularly staff still working in the field. That meant providing a steady stream of updates and information. Ongoing, robust communications allowed NCR to keep its employees informed on health and safety conditions in their immediate geographic areas, their countries, and the world.

The company shared practical information for maintaining physical and emotional well-being, such as “Seven steps for staying mentally strong during coronavirus,” and personal stories about employees successfully transitioning to work from home (WFH) situations. When it came time to consider transitioning back to working in offices, the NCR team realized that this could be difficult for many employees. To address concerns, the company shared stories of individual employees successfully making that transition, as well as general guidelines for maintaining health safety within a workplace.

Throughout the pandemic response, massive challenges were faced and overcome through urgent, unifying activity, innovation, sharing of ideas and information, and continual engagement with NCR employees and with the customers the company serves.