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ICEF Online 2.0

In its first full year of operation, ICEF Online, the world's first Internet platform for educators and agents, has grown into a community of more than 900 members. ICEF Online Director Rod Hearps underscored the importance of this during his feature presentation at the ICEF Berlin Workshop in November. "[ICEF Online] is not about the technology or the platform itself," said Hearps. "It's about the community of members that use the platform as a way to communicate, work together, and do business with one another."

Hearps went on to announce a series of new features for ICEF Online, reflecting the platform's ambition to provide a total industry solution for educator-agent collaboration. New features include:

  • a series of new online discussion boards for agents and educators
  • a secure payment gateway that will facilitate efficient, inexpensive financial transfers between agents and schools.

The payment gateway will process payments in 26 currencies for low-cost, local currency payment in 38 different countries. The ICEF Online payment gateway will use a proven system called the Clearing House Service. This system was originally established in 1995 to make international payments within member-based organizations easier and more cost effective. Today, Clearing House is used by members of the WYSE Travel Confederation, and more than 1,200 companies in total, to facilitate international payments. The Clearing House Service (CHS) has been integrated into ICEF Online for secure member-to-member financial transfers within the community. (See the Clearing House FAQ on ICEF Online for additional background.)

"CHS is our first integration component on ICEF Online," says ICEF CEO Markus Badde. "We will continue to expand our feature set by partnering with other best-of-class applications so that they operate seamlessly within ICEF Online. Our focus is on new tools that represent real innovation for international educators and agents. These include AMS, a unique agency management system, and TEAMS, a management information system for education providers. Each of these applications represents a powerful management tool in its own right, and, by connecting them with ICEF Online, we will have an opportunity to create additional booking and management systems to help community members work together more effectively."

Sidebar: AMS and TEAMS

AMS was launched to ICEF Online members at the ICEF Berlin Workshop. The system was developed by a group of international agencies over the past six years, and is the first commercial management system designed explicitly for educational agents. AMS includes robust tools for inquiry management, enrolment processing and management, financial analysis and reporting, managing school and programme information, counselling, and performance monitoring and analysis.

TEAMS was developed by Australia-based Software Dreams as a comprehensive management system for educational institutions of all sizes. The system is available in various configurations and feature sets that encompass a wide range of purpose-built tools to manage marketing, enrolment, housing services, agent relations, and more.

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