The supply of fuels, in all its aspects, is one of the core business activities of the Total Group, which, following the mergers with Elf and Fina, is now tenth-largest company in the world and, the world’s fourth-largest oil company. Based in Paris, France, the Group has around 111,000 employees and makes net sales revenue of approximately € 122,700 million euros from oil extraction, production and refining as well as trading of oil and gas products. The company has a presence in over 100 countries and plays a key role in the chemicals industry. The group markets its fuels under the well-known Total, Elf and Fina brands and runs nearly 16,000 service stations worldwide, chiefly in Europe and Africa. In 2004, Total refined 2.5 million barrels of oil each day and also sold 3.8 million barrels of petroleum products a day.

The partnership between Total and Wincor Nixdorf goes back to 1998 when the French oil giant commenced project studies aimed at equipping its European service stations with uniform front-office solutions. The goal of the studies was to pull together the quite different—and in places obsolete—ePOS systems and install EFT (electronic funds transfer) systems in compliance with the EMV standard. The key implementation criterion was “an open architecture freeing us from dependence on individual manufacturers and at the same time allowing implementation across national boundaries”, says Jean-Pierre Basbayon, the man responsible at Total for Retail Network, Pricing, Control and Systems.

The self-service solution that can offer more—and 24 hours a day. The Wincor Nixdorf software solution “NAMOS compact” meets these requirements. With its open architecture, the system removes dependence on pump suppliers and service providers, and it meets the requirements of a global solution by integrating all the EFT applications. The modular, component-based architecture also supports “plug & play", allowing business processes and customer functions to be built in without great development effort. And when it comes to service stations, there are more than just one or two of them: Tank contents have to be metered, pumps addressed, carwashes operated, fuel pumps switched on and off and the whole sales process run in the shop. At the end of 2005 in France alone, over 2,500 Total service stations and almost 3,800 ePOS systems will be running the Wincor Nixdorf solution, with around 500 fitted out in the U.K., and nearly 60 in Portugal.

With NAMOS compact, Total has also opened up the ability to integrate further innovations across the breadth of its service station network. The Outdoor Payment Terminal (OPT) is one of these. Developed at Total’s initiative and implemented with the help of the “Service Stations International” business unit within Wincor Nixdorf’s Retail Division, the OPT—first piloted in June 2004—brings together a whole range of benefits. The 12-inch touchscreen is not just easy to operate, it also offers the opportunity to run promotional advertisements. In addition, the unit is suitable for multiple use, for instance also for car washes. The combination of the two procedures makes this solution, which is based on standard banking and retail equipment, such an innovation. “This gives us a unique model and, at the same time, one we can deploy globally,“ says Basbayon.