BETHESDA, Md.-The second half of 2013 will see increased disruption in the payments landscape, but also evolving opportunities for CUs to better serve members even as branch networks shrink.
Ben Psillas, president of Cardtronics' Allpoint Network, noted that more and more credit unions will likely continue to look for more profitable payments networks, which, in turn, will present a significant opportunity for regional networks.
FIs, said Psillas, "would really like to be able to partner with STAR and route their transactions through Nice or Shazam or Discover, but unfortunately Visa and MasterCard figure out ways to say 'We're not going to do that, we're going to route through another Visa or MasterCard network.''
While many alternatives are currently in the works-from the likes of PayPal, Apple, Google Wallet and more-Psillas noted that institutions are being given a choice. "But Visa and MasterCard have written their operating rules and agreements, so it's really hard to shift over."
Another Shift Occurring
Coinciding with those shifts, said Psillas, is the well-documented shift toward increased usage of e-channels. Even as CUs shift their members in that direction and plan for reduced foot traffic and smaller branch networks, there's still a huge opportunity for credit unions.
"The opportunity for credit unions is to build things that don't serve the credit union first," said Psillas. "Build things that serve the member first that the credit union can benefit from. I find that so often in social media campaigns at credit unions and banks run, the social media page is literally like a brochure. It says what our credit union does, here's how you can benefit. That's not how you develop a social media campaign."
The most successful institutions, he said, start by empowering the member and build their strategy from there.
