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对外经济贸易大学

2000年攻读硕士学位研究生入学考试

国际经济贸易学院专业英语试题

（英译中四页 五段 每段二十分 共100分）

1.The Battle to Be Your Online Bill Collector

—Bankers hope cyberbilling can give them a toehold on the Net.

Every year, American business sends out 29 billion bills. And by any measure, the exercise isn't much fun. For companies, printing, processing and posting a typical consumer bill runs about

90.And for recipients, there’s not only a demand for payment, there 's a wad of solicitations that nearly everyone throws away.

But for banks trying to make it on the Internet, bills are cool. Bankers see bills as surefire eyeball-grabbers in an environment where it's tough to command consumer attention--and a key to protecting their existing business managing cash for big companies. Increasingly, banks are battling high-tech competitors for control of Internet billing, or electronic-bill presentment, as it is called.

To be sure, this is a fight over a business that is in its infancy. Few bills are now sent via the Net, and online payment systems often involve a paper check. But the technology exists to send bills from business to customers and route payments back on the Net. By the end of next year, industry analysts estimate upwards of 4.5 million households will be receiving bills online. What’s more, sending and handling bills over the Net should be about 40% cheaper than paper delivery, says the Gartner Group, a research firm in Stamford, Conn.

The question is who will become the bill collector on the Net. Bankers reckon that if they can turn their Web sites into mailboxes for electronic bills, they can become key entry points on the Net-portals, even. That would enable them to sell other financial services online. The fear is that existing portals, such as Yahoo! or even American Online, will become centers of bill payment and, in turn, siphon off existing bank business. "Banks have been slow to get into this," says Kenneth J. Kerr, a Garter analyst in Durham, N.C. "But they realize there is a threat here and they need to get aboard".

Banks have their advantages. They can offer customers simultaneous access to their bills and their money. Banks have long relationships with the billers, such has utilities and retailers, and centuries of experience in protecting people's money.

Big banks also are worried that technology companies offering bill presentment could muscle into one of their fastest-growing business-managing cash for big companies. After all, distributing and collecting bills is a close cousin to cash management.

At this point, predicting how the industry will shake out is premature. Banks and technology companies already have formed several alliances aimed a delivering bills on the net. More combinations are likely. What's clear, though, is the banks know they are running out of time to get their Internet billing act together.

From Business Week/July 19,1999

1. 一场争夺成为线账单收款人的战役

——银行家们希望通过在线账单业务在互联网上站稳脚跟

美国公司每年发行面额总值为290亿美元的账单。不论如何衡量，这一点丝毫令人轻松不起来。公司每印刷、加工和邮寄一张标准的由客户付款的账单成本大约为90美元。而对于接收账单者来说，账单不仅仅代表着支付请求，还是几乎是人人扔掉的废纸，它们为数巨