At present, 600 units have been installed in builders' merchants throughout the UK. The launch of the TradePro account card sees the first nationwide service based on Chip and PIN technology to go live, and the installation of the Omni 3750 terminals will continue throughout the year.

Fully endorsed by the Builders Merchants Federation (BMF) and the Federation of Master Builders (FMB), TradePro has been created to provide smaller builders and contractors with a level of professional financial services and support that has until now be unavailable to them. The majority of smaller tradesmen cannot access the credit sources available to larger companies, and as a result tend to rely on merchant-based trade accounts. TradePro overcomes these obstacles by providing a tradecard and associated line of credit that can be used expressly for the purchase of building materials in hundreds of different merchants nationwide.

David Bloom, TradePro's CEO commented, "VeriFone made the process of rolling out a major new service to our customers pain-free, by rapidly developing and delivering a robust, reliable solution. The small footprint of the Omni 3750 terminal and the ability to meet tough time to market constraints were crucial factors in our decision to work with VeriFone."

The Omni 3750 features a powerful 32-bit processor to meet the security and networking demands of Internet Protocol (IP) communications, and the toughest standards for EMV smartcards. It features up to 6MB of memory to support plenty of value-added applications. It supports advanced communications such as Ethernet, built on IP technology, which fuels "always-on" connectivity, and it has the power to securely send transactions over public or private networks using industry standard SSL encryption.

Commenting on today's announcement, Nigel Bidmead, EMEA Managing Director for VeriFone said, "VeriFone understands that speed to market is a critical issue for our customers and our focus has always been on developing the strongest possible solutions in the fastest development time. This successful solution for TradePro was built on the unbeatable foundation of our world-class development expertise and the de facto leader for payment terminals - the Omni 3750."

The Omni 3750 also offers a future-proof solution with field-replaceable Communication and Security Access Modules (SAMs), allowing additional secure smart card applications or communications options to be deployed as and when they are required, as well as field upgradeable modem options to ISDN, Ethernet and wireless communications for easy access to any IP-based network.

The Omni 3750 supports Triple DES Master Session and DUKPT key management techniques, permitting high degree of flexibility in managing EFTPoS transaction security. EMV certifications and on and offline PED approvals add unparalleled levels of security to help stem the tide of fraudulent transactions.