BRIDGETON, Mo. — Vantage CU is believed to be the first financial institution to create an online banking app for Twitter.
Why start with Twitter? Because development was "quick and easy," and the social networking site was a sure way to reach a growing number of members, the credit union said.
"This is our first mobile banking solution," explained Matt Fagala, application support manager at the $560-million CU. "On the mobile side, you have to go where the people are."
Whereas other credit unions have picked more expensive SMS texting or custom websites for mobile banking, or even offered banking interfaces through Facebook, Vantage CU is the only financial institution to turn to Twitter, where nearly 10 million online users in self-selected communities exchange short messages with one another.
Vantage released the solution, called tweetMyMoney, on Sept. 27, after about three weeks of programming and proofing, Fagala said. "We haven't found anyone else who is doing this."
A Matter of Trust
Perhaps that's because some people don't seem to trust Twitter with their money. Vantage took that perspective into consideration, said Fagala, making a critical decision: no personal credentials associated with online banking or with Twitter are exchanged during a transaction.
In fact, tweetMyMoney is a lot like text banking. Once online banking members have registered for tweetMyMoney, they can use Twitter on their computers or mobile devices to request a transaction from Vantage Credit Union.
Members use commands that are much like text banking, such as for internal transfers: "#tran $100 f9 t0" (transfer $100 from savings account number ending in 9 to checking account number ending in 0). Users can also monitor balances — the most prevalent command — and deposits, withdrawals, holds and cleared checks.
A Continual Clean Sweep
Meanwhile, Vantage software continually sweeps members' Twitter accounts for the commands. The software automatically executes the transactions behind the Vantage online banking login and sends back a "tweet" with a confirmation — all in less than a minute, said Fagala.
The credit union took security one step further by rolling out its Correspondence Authentication Codes program when it launched tweetMyMoney, he continued. Each tweetMyMoney transaction confirmation contains a personal six-digit code, one for each day of the week, to verify it as a communication from Vantage CU. Members can choose and store the codes within their Vantage CU online banking login, which is secured by passwords and biometric authentication.
Though Vantage is hoping that tweetMyMoney will eventually have 4,000 users, about 80 VCU members were enrolled as this article went to press, said Fagala. "Not everyone will like or understand tweetMyMoney, but there are a lot of people who want it and are enjoying it. Some of these things may crash and burn. We're prepared to accept that, but there's value in trying them." TweetMyMoney is subject to the same security concerns you might have with other forms of unencrypted communication, like e-mail, Fagala suggested.
"If you really look at tweetMyMoney security, it's no different from what's already been done with online banking services, such as alerts and event triggers. E-mail could be even worse. And then you've got Mint, Wesabe and Geezeo, which are actually storing credentials."
Vantage plans to add to tweetMyMoney with a similar service at Facebook, iPhone and Blackberry applications and a less expensive approach to text banking — "we're not thrilled with the price to maintain an SMS number," said Fagala.
Unlike Apple with iPhone applications, Twitter did require that tweetMyMoney go through an approval process. However, Twitter did grant Vantage's request to send high volumes of tweets.
