Planet POL Pro: Streamlining VAT Refunds
A Web-based Application for Efficient VAT Management
Efficient VAT Management
Integrated System Communication
Project Overview
Planet POL Pro is a web application developed for Planet Payment. This solution issues VAT refund forms, transmits them to Planet’s core system, and prints out the corresponding PDF form for the customer, thereby streamlining the VAT refund process at points of sale.
Client
Planet is a major provider of international payment services and solutions. They offer a comprehensive range of services such as Point of Sale, eCommerce, and ATM solutions, which they provide across various sectors, including retail, hospitality, and finance.
Client Name
Planet Payment
Services Provided
Project Management, Software Engineering, Full Stack Development
Duration
Ongoing since 2017
Country
Multinational
Industry
Retail and Finance
Business challenge
Given the complexity of VAT refund processes, Planet wanted an easy-to-use web-based application to efficiently streamline these processes for both retailers and consumers. Therefore, they aimed to create a web-based app capable of issuing VAT refund forms, submitting these to Planet’s core system, and consequently producing a printable PDF form for the customer. This needed to integrate seamlessly with the point of sale, speeding up transactions and reducing potential errors and queues.
Technical Challenge
For optimal speed and efficiency, the application had to integrate with various passport and credit card scanners, thus enabling automatic identification of customer eligibility. Our implemented QR code scanner reads the code of the company’s own loyalty program (Premier Pass), AliPay for Asian customers and retrieves the corresponding customer data directly from the Planet core system.
Solution
The POLPro was developed as a robust solution to meet Planet’s requirements. Its rollout process was faster, ensuring a timely implementation. The application communicates with Planet’s core systems via API, with form generation taking place in the background.
By using POLPro, Planet has streamlined its VAT refund process, making it faster and more efficient for retailers and customers. This solution has helped enhance customer satisfaction, reduce errors, and increase overall operational efficiency.
The Application
Technical Details
POLPro, like most of our projects, is based on the PHP framework Laravel. Data is sent via the API to Planet core systems. Crucially, low latency, fast response times, and above all, extremely high availability are vital. The system produces forms as HTML before converting them into a PDF. Furthermore, the system is actively used in 7 countries and has already issued nearly half a million vouchers. With an uptime of 99.9933% and an average response time of ~350ms in 2022, contractual agreements were far exceeded.
Planet Payment
A financial services provider operating in 64 countries, specializing in payments, VAT refunds, and credit card processing.
