A former Visa Interactive executive is running a recently formed NYCE Corp. division dedicated to home banking and bill payment.
Paul A. Tomasofsky was hired two months ago as vice president of remote banking services, the company announced recently.
Mr. Tomasofsky, 38, is responsible for telephone and PC-based home banking, bill payment services, and remittance processing, in all of which the electronic banking network has been expanding.
The Woodcliff Lake, N.J., company has been running home banking pilot programs with two members, Bank of New York and Marine Midland Bank, Buffalo, a unit of HSBC Holdings PLC.
NYCE plans to expand the pilots later this summer to live operation for those banks, and to offer the same services to other members, said Steven A. Rathgaber, executive vice president.
Initially the programs would let consumers pay bills, transfer funds, and check account balances.
NYCE also plans to introduce electronic payment services for banks' small-business customers.
Mr. Rathgaber said NYCE was attracted by Mr. Tomasofsky's two-year tenure at Visa Interactive, where, as director of implementation for remote banking, he oversaw installations with First Union Corp. and Fleet Financial Group. Visa Interactive is reportedly being sold to Integrion Financial Network, a consortium of 16 banks and International Business Machines Corp.
Before joining Visa Interactive, Mr. Tomasofsky spent 14 years at First National Bank of Maryland in various management positions.
In an interview, Mr. Tomasofsky said the challenge in electronic banking is figuring out which of the many payment schemes now competing for customer attention will turn out to be winners.
"The key to success in today's banking world is to have multiple bets," he said. "One of the strategies has got to work out."
Alan P. Pohlman, executive vice president at Carmody & Bloom Inc. and a former NYCE executive, said the network's moves into interactive services come at a time when all its peer networks are looking for new revenues.
"Most are looking for what's beyond the ATM and POS business that they are now heavily involved in, but that are also heavily saturated," said Mr. Pohlman, who is based in Ridgewood, N.J.
"It's an area that has gotten a lot of attention at NYCE recently," the consultant said. "It's particularly important with respect to some of the moves the larger transaction processing entities have made in recent times."
Mr. Tomasofsky plans to take advantage of NYCE's network and the systems already in place at member banks. "We want to leverage everything we have in the infrastructure," he said.
