First National Bank has expanded its mobile banking service to include payments to third parties in addition to balance enquiries, transfers between accounts and cellphone airtime purchases.
"After a week of final testing, FNB cellphone banking customers will be able to make payments from anywhere at anytime from next week," says Len Pienaar, CEO of mobile and transact solutions at FNB.
With over 90 000 customers registering for cellphone banking since the launch of the bank`s broad-access mobile banking service for all networks and all handsets four months ago, Pienaar says he believes FNB has the largest cellphone banking subscriber base in the country.
This rapid subscription rate is in strong contrast with the relatively slow adoption rate of FNB`s initial cellphone banking offering that required special software and handsets.
Pienaar points out that FNB`s initial mobile banking offering that used wireless Internet gateway (WIG) and wireless application protocol (WAP) technology, attracted only 50 000 subscribers in four years, but the new SMS-based service exceeded that in four months.
"Having reached this milestone much faster than we ever expected with an average of around 550 customers registering for cellphone banking every day, I believe the time is right to expand the service to include third party payments," says Pienaar.
The bank has adopted a conservative approach to the new service, allowing payments only to pre-registered beneficiaries with a limit of R10 000 a day. This means no once-off payments and users will have to access FNB`s call centre, branches, or Internet banking to add beneficiaries.
Pienaar says at between R3 and R9 a transaction, the new cellphone third party payment rates are affordable for most South Africans and particularly economical for customers who do not live near a bank branch or ATM.
Surprising findings
"The rapid adoption of cellphone banking shows there is clearly a demand for 24-hour mobile banking and that customers are already comfortable doing their banking this way," says Pienaar, although he admits there have been some surprises along the way.
"Contrary to expectations, all sectors of banking customers are adopting cellphone banking with 51% coming from entry level bankers and the biggest proportion of registrations has not come from customers registered for Internet banking, with only 18% of registrations being made online," explains Pienaar.
Another surprise, says Pienaar, is that as much as one third of subscribers actively and consistently use cellphone banking around five times a month on average as banking is becoming more on demand than planned.
"Cellphone banking is more about mobility than functionality and is the first means of providing universal access to banking as well as a direct, real-time communication channel between banks and customers," says Pienaar.
Although clearly enjoying his pioneer status in cellphone banking, Pienaar says he hopes the other banks will soon follow suit.
"I believe an industry play would be far better than an individual play, particularly as there will ultimately have to be some form of co-operation and standardisation between banks to realise the full potential of cellphone banking as there was with ATMs."
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