Thank you for attending BAI Payments Connect Conference & Expo, co-sited with BAI Combating Payments Fraud and BAI CheckImage.
BAI is committed to delivering high quality and objective emerging payments content in 2011. Please visit the BAI Payments Connect website for upcoming payments event opportunities.
Top Five Takeaways from BAI Payments Connect 2010
Managing a payments business has become increasingly complex as options and alternatives available to consumers continues to grow. However payments professionals continue to look to the future with a fair amount of excitement and anticipation, as was evident at BAI Payments Connect.
This excitement focused specifically on mobile banking and emerging payments but also in a larger sense on a payments world where same-day, real-time transactions will become the norm.
1. This really is the year of mobile banking, according to Jaime Punishill, senior vice president, strategic planning and new channel development, at New York City-based Citibank. Punishill cited the advent of the smartphone, which represents a quantum leap in cell phone technology, the influence of tech-savvy Gen Y customers in the market and the burgeoning growth of social media.
2. The financial services industry continues to embrace mobile banking, 11% of U.S. households had adopted mobile banking by 2009, up from only 1% in 2007, representing a faster growth curve than seen in any other previous financial services innovations, including ATMs, debit cards and online banking.
3. Banks will see a decrease of 16% in annual fee income. That prediction came in reference to the Fed’s new restrictions on overdraft fees. Bank of America is taking things one step further than the Fed requires. On March 10, Bank of America announced that customers will soon be unable to spend more than they have in the accounts linked to their debit cards. Bank of America is the first big bank to announce such a change, but it likely won't be the last.
4. We’re probably better off doing it before we are told to do it. Jan Estep, president and CEO of NACHA – The Electronic Payments Association, delivered this assessment in response to a question about whether the Automated Clearing House (ACH) system would incorporate same-day transaction capabilities by 2020. Rich Oliver, executive vice president and retail payment product manager at the Atlanta Fed, agreed with Estep, noting the existence of same-day transactions in Europe. “In this world today, either we figure out how to do it or someone else will,” Oliver said.
5. Attractive payments alternatives offered by nonbank providers like PayPal and Wal-Mart are enticing consumers. Wal-Mart’s MoneyCenter offers various bank like services in their stores. In 2008, 12% of all U.S. e-commerce sales in the fourth quarter of 2008 were run through PayPal, which also offers debit cards and a service for small businesses to pay their employees. One reason for the success of both companies is their ability to take advantage of built-in customer bases – Wal-Mart with its in-store traffic and PayPal with its eBay connection.