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PSCU Financial Services, a credit union service organization, soon will begin reselling mobile-banking services to its 1,100 credit unions in a marketing effort to encourage more young people to join credit unions. The service, which PSCU is calling mBanking, eventually will enable users to check prepaid card balances, Doug Lokrantz, PSCU's mobile-banking services manager, tells ATM&Debit News, a CardLine sister publication. St. Petersburg, Fla.-based PSCU signed an agreement to resell Sausalito, Calif.-based mFoundry's Applet solution, which enables cell phone users to download applications onto their phones. In addition, PSCU will offer a Wireless Application Protocol, which PSCU developed internally, to credit union members. The wireless protocol uses a cell phone's Web browser to access mBanking information via the Internet, and mFoundry accesses mBanking information through a menu-driven application, Lokrantz says. Initially, both services will allow cell phone users to transfer funds between bank accounts and monitor checking and savings account balances. In the future, mFoundry and the Wireless Application Protocol will provide access to prepaid, credit card and bill-payment accounts, Lokrantz says. PSCU is offering the services partly to attract members of Generation Y, or those born between 1976 and 2000, he says. "Our surveys and other surveys show 40% to 50% of Generation Y members are looking for financial institutions that offer mobile-banking services," he adds. Generation Y is too big to ignore, Lokrantz says. There are more than 76 million individuals in this age group, according demographers. PSCU completed a pilot last year that offers mobile-banking services to PSCU members, and it will roll out mBanking within a month, Lokrantz says.
