About Us

EXPERIENCE

Our experience covers the following areas:

Strategic Level

Policy development (at central bank, industry association and financial institution levels) in areas such as payment strategy development, operations risk mitigation, fraud prevention, bank supervision and national legislation
External Consultant & Advisors - various advisory roles on bank and bank systems to central banks, banking associations and financial institutions.

Operations level

RTGS design, development and implementation (at central bank and financial institution level)
SWIFT expertise in interfacing design, usage, CUG development and implementation
Education & training of bank staff in all payments, risk and operations aspects
SWIFT operational expertise
Risk Assessment and Mitigation at a bank operations level
All issues relating to Fraud awareness and Fraud prevention
Bank product design and development including legal aspects, document design, establishment of procedures
Operations management – branch operations management, electronic banking operations management, international trade finance (import-export)
Education & training of bank staff in all aspects of payments, operations, operations risk and fraud.

Software

Banking software design, development and implementation (both in “in-house” and at commercial software firms). This includes payment systems, trade finance, commercial RTGS systems, wholesale and retail payments and e-commerce.
Business Analysis - business/systems analysis, writing functional specifications, quality assurance and the reengineering of payments procedures and internal business practices.
Education & training of bank staff in all aspects of specific software
Project management – project management roles
Systems implementation & implementation engineering

Citadel Advantage has extensive banking experience in a number of different countries:

Africa: South Africa, Botswana, Malawi, Namibia, Swaziland, Lesotho
Asia: China, Kazakhstan, Singapore.
Australia
Europe: France, Denmark, Greece, Ireland, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom.
Middle East: Bahrain, Israel
North America: USA, Canada, Bermuda

STAFF

Richard Barr

Company Director & Principal Associate

Richard holds a B.S. in International Business Administration from a leading California University. His professional experience spans 21 years, 5 of which were spent with a leading U.S. Bank. Another 5 were spent honing his global banking expertise, involved with Trade Finance and cross border banking. 10 years have been in the Private and High-tech sectors providing high-level consulting services, business analysis, project management and training to a wide banking clientele spanning the globe.

More recently as an Advisor to a central bank on RTGS, Payment Systems Reform and Continuous Linked Settlement Projects he was involved in setting up the original project as well as providing inputs into various specialized aspects such as (1) other payment & settlement systems, (2) securities settlements (3) technology, (4) RFI product analysis (5) RTGS business model, (6) RFP development, (7) system testing, (8) operations and (9) Project Management. Specific specialist areas handled include RTGS System Design, Technology Risk Assessment, Complete design and execution of functionality tests and follow through leading to successful user acceptance testing, and system communications & SWIFT.

He has spent extensive time with a diversity of “financial institutional” clients in South Africa, Poland, Sweden, Ireland, Netherlands, Greece, Bermuda, Israel, Malawi, United Kingdom, North America and many other countries. Richard has filled the role of advisor to central banks on payment systems and technical payments issues.

CLIENTS, PARTNERS & COURSE ATTENDEES

A sample of the banks represented by attendees in our courses

ABN Amro International
ABSA South Africa
Banca Comerciale Romania Romania
Banca Romanesca Romania
Bank Dhofar Oman
Central Bank Bank of England United Kingdom
Central Bank Bank Indonesia Indonesia
Central Bank Bank of Ireland Ireland
Central Bank Bank of Portugal Portugal
Barcalys Bank International
Capitec Bank South Africa
Central Bank Central Bank of Kuwait Kuwait
Citigroup International
Central Bank De Nederlandsche Bank Netherlands
Export Development Bank of Egypt Egypt
First Rand Bank South Africa
Imperial Bank South Africa
Investcorp Bank Bahrain
Kaupthing Bank Luxembourg
MKB Bank Hungary
Central Bank National Bank of Denmark Denmark
Nedbank South Africa
Porsche Bank Romania
Qatar Islamic Bank Qatar
Qatar National Bank Qatar
Rabobank International
Rand Merchat Bank South Africa
Rennies Bank South Africa
Saudi French Bank Saudi Arabia
Central Bank South African Reserve Bank South Africa
MKB Bank Hungary
Krajowa Izba Rozliczeniowa S.A. Poland
Deutsche Bank International
HBOS United Kingdom
Stanbic Bank Botswana
Standard Bank of South Africa South Africa

International GRC & Operations Consulting