KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Commerce Bancshares will offer Western Union's Cash Card electronic payroll service to its corporate customers.
Cash Card, a service of First Data Corp., enables employers to provide electronic payments to employees, even if they do not have bank accounts.
Employees can use the Cash Card to access their money from automated teller machines and from the Western Union retail agent network of grocery stores, convenience stores, and discount chains.
Twenty percent of Americans do not have checking accounts or credit cards, according to the Federal Reserve.
"For many employers, paper checks are becoming a thing of the past, because you sometimes have to worry about check stock and storage, fraud, stop payments, and reconciliation of out-of-cycle checks," said Doug McNary, president of First Data Integrated Debit Services, which manages the Cash Card service.
