BROOKFIELD, Wis. – Fiserv said yesterday its Fiserv CBS Worldwide unit has signed with BioPassword Inc. to offer the company’s multi-factor authentication tool to its credit union and banking customers. BioPassword’s software uses a combination of the user’s standard login credentials (username and password), keystroke biometrics (their unique typing rhythm), knowledge-based authentication (user-selected questions and answers) or one-time passwords, to ensure system access only to authorized users.

WALNUT CREEK, Calif. – Pacific Service CU rolled out a new CD with blended pricing. Called the “7 for 11” CD, it pays a 7% rate for 11 months on the first $10,000 of a $50,000 deposit. The remaining $40,000 or more may be invested for any term of 12 months or longer (maximum of 60 months) at the credit union’s prevailing rate for the term selected. The credit union’s current rates are 5% for 12 months and longer.

DENVER – Bellco CU is passing out unabridged copies of the U.S. Constitution this week to almost 3,000 fifth and sixth graders to help celebrate Constitution Week. The credit union also is handing out question & answer flashcards that explain what is in the document. Constitution Week was founded by the non-profit Liberty Day organization, which aims to teach students about the nature of U.S. government with the slogan, “A Constitution in every pocket.”

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – Harvard University Employees CU yesterday said it has begun issuing MasterCard PayPass cards to its members, one of the first credit unions to deploy the contactless cards technology. The credit union is issuing its members Debit MasterCards with MasterCard’s PayPass payment functionality. There are more than 16 million PayPass cards and devices in use at more than 55,000 merchant locations worldwide, including Fenway Park and numerous quick-serve restaurants, cafés, pharmacies, retail establishments and convenience stores in the vicinity of Harvard University.

ALBANY, N.Y. – SEFCU today will cut the ribbon dedicating its fifth downtown branch here, inside the Albany Housing Authority building. New York’s largest credit union already has 22 branches in the capital area. SEFCU formerly was known as State Employees FCU.

MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. – Shares in PHH Corp. yesterday traded down 17% after private equity giant The Blackstone Group disclosed it was having trouble financing the buyout of the company’s mortgage business, the biggest mortgage bank for credit unions. PHH said it will push forward with the $31.50 a share sale to GE Capital, which plans to retain PHH’s fleet business and sell the mortgage operations to The Blackstone Group. PHH said Blackstone told GE Capital that it may be as much as $750 million short on financing its part of the deal. PHH told shareholders yesterday it still expects GE Capital to complete its share of the deal. Shareholders of PHH are scheduled to vote on the deal next Wednesday. PHH acquired the mortgage business of CUNA Mutual Group in 2005, making it the largest mortgage bank for credit unions. The business consisted of 100,000 residential loans in a $12 billion loan servicing portfolio and relationships with as many as 2,000 credit unions. PHH shares closed down $4.26, or 15%, yesterday, at $24.24.

WALL STREET – Fitch Ratings downgraded First Data Corp.’s long-term debt to junk status, citing expectations the company’s debt load will be increased substantially after the pending $27 billion buyout of the payments giant by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. Fitch said it had cut its issuer default rating to B+ (the fourth-highest “junk” rating) from investment grade BBB to reflect First Data's "substantially higher leveraged and debt requirements.” The rating downgrade came as bankers yesterday began to sell an initial $5 million in loans. Separately, First Data announced a massive consolidation that will combine 12 call centers into just three, and its command centers from seven to two. The company would not say how many employees would be laid off as part of the $150 million cost-saving plan.

NEW YORK – New York City officials are teaming with four community development credit unions and four banks to offer no-fee starter accounts as part of a city-wide savings initiative. Participants in the city’s “Opportunity NYC” initiative will receive $50 to open a low-cost account in one of the eight participating credit unions and banks, which will provide them with easy access to their funds, encourage saving and budgeting, and help them establish credit. Participating credit unions are: Bethex FCU, Brooklyn Cooperative FCU, Lower East Sides Peoples FCU and Union Settlement FCU. The starter accounts will charge no fees, require no minimum balance, and provide an ATM card. Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s Opportunity NYC consists of three separate pilot programs aimed at improving the education, health and work-force outcomes for adults and children living in poverty. More than 5,000 poor families in New York already have signed up for the program, which offers financial rewards for completing specific activities related to education, health, employment and training. Families can earn up to $5,000 a year. The $50 million program is being privately funded by the Rockefeller Foundation, the Broad Foundation, the Starr Foundation, the Robin Hood Foundation, the Open Society Institute, the American International Group and Mayor Bloomberg, personally.

WASHINGTON – The Federal Reserve said it won’t shorten check-hold times under the Electronic Funds Transfer Act to facilitate the Check 21 law, but a reduction in the Fed’s check clearing operations will have the same effect. That’s because in reducing the Fed’s check processing offices from 45 in 2003 to just four by 2011, most checks will come under the two-day hold time allowed for “local” checks from the same Fed region; as opposed to the five-day hold allowed for “non-local” checks transported between regions, a Fed payments official told attendees to CUNA’s Payments Systems Conference yesterday. Louise Roseman, director of the Fed’s operations, said the Fed decided the Check 21 law is too new and implementation too sparse for the Fed to shorten hold times in order to take advantage of the expedited payments under the law. But consumers already are benefiting from the new law, which gave electronic check images the same legal standing as paper checks. “Most consumers are already getting availability for funds even faster than the law requires,” Roseman said. And the continued decrease in the Fed’s check processing offices–already down to 20 this year–will act as a de facto shortening of the hold times when the Fed moves to just four regional offices by 2011, she said.

SAN ANTONIO — San Antonio-based Security Service FCU, which acquired the remains of failed New Horizons Community FCU in June, said Friday it has agreed to acquire Horizon CU, a $35 million credit union in Portland, Texas.

EL PASO — The FBI will have to return almost $76,000 it confiscated from a local executive as part of a corruption probe if federal prosecutors are unable to convince a federal judge they are entitled to the funds, the judge ruled last week.

SAN ANTONIO - Focusing on competing with other credit unions when there are so many other sharks in the financial services ocean has shifted credit unions away from the very thing that makes them a fish of a different hue: cooperation.

Of the many afflictions that plague those who either move to or spend too much time in Washington is the dreaded-and surprisingly difficult to treat- InsideTheBeltwayitis. Perhaps the best thing that can be said about the disease, whose onset is quick among those who never see any of the country or world beyond the circle freeway around the capital, is that it's bipartisan; the worst is that its symptoms torment tens of millions of others far more than the carriers themselves.

ATLANTA - As part of an ongoing effort to offer strategies that help you make 2007 a success, CU Journal has launched its "7 in 07" series, chock full of ideas for your CU to implement.

DAYTON, Ohio - NCR reported the Internal Revenue Service has approved the pending spin-off of its Teradata data warehousing subsidiary as a tax-free transaction. The IRS ruling sets the stage for the spin-off of Teradata to NCR shareholders on a one-to-one share basis. The spin-off is scheduled to take place Sept. 14. Teradata will trade on the NYSE under the symbol TDC. (c) 2007 The Credit Union Journal and SourceMedia, Inc. All Rights Reserved. http://www.cujournal.com http://www.sourcemedia.com

FIS Teams Up With MaPS

ALEXANDRIA, Va. - NCUA reported it approved an application from Kinecta FCU to add more than 5.5 million residents in surrounding low-income communities to its field of membership, by far the largest underserved expansion ever granted.

AUSTIN, Texas - Multi-factor authentication (MFA) tools will soon turn one year old at many credit unions, but its seems unlikely that a celebration is in order, according to a new, informal survey of 50 CU managers conducted by the Credit Union Information Security Professionals Association (CUISPA) here.

OAK RIDGE, Tenn. - K-25 FCU is shedding its original identity and being renamed Enrichment FCU to help members and potential members focus on its new community charter.

NEEDHAM, Mass. - TowerGroup has released new research on micropayments and the effect such payments will have on the future. Among the topline findings: