Hockey Canada Chooses Optimal Payments' NETBANX Payment Processing Service for its Online Registry System

MONTREAL, April 2, 2012 /PRNewswire/ - Optimal Payments is pleased to announce that Hockey Canada has selected the NETBANX service to provide online payment processing for its Hockey Canada online registry system (HCR).

The HCR system manages registrations for more than 565,000 players and 180,000 registered participants in thousands of associations governed by its thirteen members branches - the British Columbia Amateur Hockey Association, Hockey Alberta, Saskatchewan Hockey Association, Hockey Manitoba, Hockey Northwestern Ontario, Hockey North, Ontario Hockey Federation, Ottawa District Hockey Association, Hockey Québec, Hockey Nova Scotia, Hockey New Brunswick, Hockey PEI and Hockey Newfoundland and Labrador.

Integrated directly into the HCR system, the NETBANX solution provides an easy-to-use, convenient way for association members to pay registration fees using Visa, MasterCard, INTERAC Online and direct bank debits. Members can make one-time payments or choose to pay in convenient instalments.  Once activated, the NETBANX service can also be used by the associations to process online payments for other services such as tournaments, clinic registrations, merchandise sales and fundraising activities.

Hockey Canada chose to partner with Optimal Payments and its NETBANX solution based on their long standing reputation in the Canadian market for delivering secure, online payment solutions.

"We are pleased to be able to offer convenient online payment options to players and participants while significantly reducing the workload of processing paper based registrations for associations," said Danny Chazonoff, Chief Operating Officer of Optimal Payments.

Today the NETBANX gateway is trusted by Internet 500 companies and respected brands around the globe to provide secure online processing of credit cards, debit cards, direct debit, online banking and e-wallet payments as well as a multitude of alternative payment options that are preferred in international markets.   Online merchants also know they can count on NETBANX's proprietary "risk rules engine" and customizable fraud screening tools to minimize their fraud losses and liability, and its support of tokenization to reduce their PCI-DSS exposure.

About NETBANX®

NETBANX, a part of Optimal Payments, is a trusted provider of secure online payment gateway solutions.  Since 1996, thousands of e-commerce, MOTO, and multi-channel businesses around the world rely on the NETBANX gateway and services for the payment processing of credit/debit cards, online direct debit and alternative payments as well as the management of online payment fraud.  The NETBANX gateway is state-of-the art, geo-redundant and PCI-DSS Level 1 compliant.  A robust and flexible platform, it can be configured or customized to meet the card-not-present needs of any businesses from local e-commerce websites to large scale international online businesses.

For more information about NETBANX visit www.netbanx.com.

About Optimal Payments

Optimal Payments is a global provider of online payment solutions.  Trusted by businesses and consumers in over 180 countries to move and manage billions of dollars each year, merchants use the NETBANX ® processing service to simplify how they accept and settle credit card, direct-from-bank, and cash payments; and the NETELLER ® payment account to increase margins, capture new customers and increase their lifetime value. Being an independent provider has allowed the company to support tens-of-thousands merchants around the globe across a wide range of industries.  Optimal Payments Plc is quoted on the London Stock Exchange's AIM market, with a ticker symbol of OPAY. Subsidiary company NETELLER (UK) Ltd is authorized and regulated as an e-money issuer by the UK's Financial Services Authority (FSA).

For more information on Optimal Payments visit www.optimalpayments.com or subscribe at www.optimalpayments.com/feed.

About Hockey Canada

Hockey Canada oversees the management of programs in Canada from entry-level to high performance teams and competitions, including world championships and the Olympic Winter Games. Hockey Canada is also Canada's voice within the International Ice Hockey Federation. Hockey Canada has offices in Calgary and Ottawa and operates regional centres in Western Canada, Ontario, Quebec and Atlantic Canada.  For more information, visit www.hockeycanada.ca

SOURCE Optimal Payments Inc.