17 Mar COVID-19
To our customers and partners,
COVID-19 has brought the world into unchartered territory. While the needs are many, clearly the health of everyone is of primary importance. EVO also understands that uninterrupted service is critical to the health of your business. We want to assure you that here at EVO, we have always maintained extensive business continuity plans, and in the current environment we are implementing those plans and taking all other steps necessary to ensure uninterrupted service to you.
As a global business, we have witnessed firsthand as the contagion has expanded from Asia-Pacific (where we have offices in Suzhou, China) to Europe (where we have 7 offices throughout the continent) to now descending on our markets in North America. We have applied our learnings from the onset of COVID-19 in China to enhance our preparations throughout Europe and North America. As a source for optimism, we would note that on March 2nd our Suzhou office resumed normal office hours and most of our employees have now returned to the office.
We have every confidence that our greatest strength as an organization is our people. The health and safety of our employees remains our top priority. Consistent with the recommendations from global health authorities, we have taken steps to avoid non-essential persons in EVO’s offices. School cancellations in the communities surrounding many of our largest office locations have further challenged our normal office attendance policies. For those employees with the ability to work from home, EVO has implemented a “remote work” policy and provided employees with the technology necessary to do so.
For those roles that require office attendance (which includes customer and technical support and risk monitoring, among others), we are taking significant steps to ensure seamless service delivery while safeguarding employee health. We have implemented “Team A, Team B” within teams in each office, giving EVO the ability to alternate teams in the office and mitigate the possibility that a single team experiences widespread illness. We similarly maintain office redundancy initiatives, whereby certain support services can be transitioned from one office to another if a single office is completely incapacitated. We have been actively testing these procedures in recent days to ensure that if implemented, the transition will be uneventful to our merchants and partners. Where possible, we have created physical separation between teams within a single office location to avoid unnecessary interaction.
We appreciate your understanding as we adjourn all in-person interaction. Until the virus has abated to a point we can resume normal operations, we have asked our employees to avoid all business travel of any kind, and we are no longer welcoming non-essential visitors to our office locations. We are replacing in-person meetings with either telephonic or video interaction. Consistent with the recommendations of health authorities, we have implemented social distancing and appropriate hygiene policies for all our offices
To further ensure uninterrupted transaction processing to you, we have implemented “peak season freeze” on all EVO systems, making only essential system changes. While we have a significant number of exciting new products on the horizon, we intend to delay deploying any new products until circumstances have normalized.
Finally, we also wish to take this opportunity to remind you that periods of uncertainty often correspond to elevated incidents of fraud. We kindly ask that you work with us to safeguard your businesses and the funds you have worked so hard to generate.
We will continue to monitor the development of COVID-19 and communicate with you as the situation evolves. We thank you for your continued trust and partnership. We take your trust seriously, and we are working tirelessly to earn that trust every hour of every day. While no one could have imagined the current circumstances, EVO’s preparation and dedication will ensure we maintain our commitment to service excellence.
Wishing you and your families the very best in the days and week ahead. Stay safe.
Brendan Tansill, President, the Americas
Darren Wilson, President, International