This week, FIS announced the release of their new iPhone appwhich allows a consumer to enroll in mobile banking without leavingtheir phone.Yes, according to FIS, that means no PC or online bankaccount required for the process.Interestingly, the applicationleverages the consumer’s debit card as an authentication tokenwhich represents such an obvious intersection between legacy andleading bank technologies.
As I’ve written about before, many new payment and financialservice products rely on a layering of new user id’s, specialcodes, one-time use numbers, and the like.What appeals to me aboutthis application is that the consumer simply has to have a debitcard and a mobile phone.This makes educating consumers about thenew product easier, shrinks the operational footprint, and arguably(full disclosure – I have not tried the app myself) offers a higherdegree of usability.
I remember when bank-by-phone was first introduced and it alsoleveraged a well-worn consumer experience, the humble telephone, tocreate what was at that time, a cutting edge banking experience.Inthe run up to creating the next generation of financial serviceaccess tools, it’s nice to see that there’s still a place for thefamiliar with the fantastic.
You can read the entire release here:http://fis.mediaroom.com/index.php?s=43&item=736.