Checking

Credit unions intensified their focus on gathering deposits in 2019 but many institutions are still looking for cheaper core funding.

If a checking account doesn’t come with checks anymore, can it still be called a checking account? It’s a valid question that the financial services industry should be asking itself.

Deluxe has spent many years working to diversify beyond paper checks, which are in an inevitable decline. But that diversity led to confusion.

The shift from person-to-person deposits to digital options – including mobile, ATMs and RDC – has created new challenges to fraud prevention efforts.

The investment bank's new CashPlus Account comes with a mobile banking app, a debit card, online bill payment and other banklike features.

After a decline, fraud has recently spiked. But there are measures companies can take to stay ahead of the crooks, says Nvoicepay's Alyssa Callahan.

CEO William Demchak said the bank has witnessed "a lot of mischief" among customers who open checking accounts to collect bonuses and then never use the accounts again.

Fiserv has sold a lockbox processing unit to Deluxe, the second such acquisition for Deluxe in as many months.

The challenger bank might use the proceeds from its latest funding round to buy other fintechs that would allow it to add more products and services, its CEO said.

Citizens Bank's Bruce Van Saun is our Banker of the Year; shake-up continues at Wells Fargo with poaching of Santander's CEO; the Navy commander behind the credit union banks love to hate; and more from this week's most-read stories.

CEO Charlie Scharf said in a letter to Congress that a review is underway to determine how many customers were affected by confusion over monthly fees and that the bank will begin issuing refunds next year.

Rep. Katie Porter, D-Calif., wants details about refunding "hundreds of millions of dollars" in fees improperly charged on checking accounts. Wells has acknowledged the potential problem but hasn't estimated how much it owes.

It’s only a matter of time before Silicon Valley “overturns more complex banking functions”; banks would have to help FinCEN identify suspicious firearms sales.

By working with the tech giant on its consumer checking account, Stanford FCU hopes to grow but some wonder about the broader implications for fields of membership.

Questions about the search giant's planned use of transactional data resonate not only with wary consumers, but also with banks that are worried about big tech’s financial services ambitions, as well as lawmakers and regulators concerned about the tech industry’s growing reach.

Google has partnered with Citigroup and a California credit union to offer consumer checking accounts, a person familiar with the matter said.

Tech giant takes will work with Citi; the bank reportedly asked IT providers to return some of the money it paid them in 2018.

Tinker Federal Credit Union has allowed the retailer to install its lockers at several locations. It's one of a variety of new tactics institutions are using to get potential new members in the door.

After a news report said the bank kept alive accounts customers thought they had closed, Sen. Elizabeth Warren told acting CEO Allen Parker in a letter that Wells is "still fundamentally broken."

The health care payments market is big – accounting for over one in six dollars of the U.S. GDP – yet it remains perpetually outdated with its heavy reliance on using paper statements for sending out bills.